


And I Fell

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, How Do I Tag, Major Character Injury, Minor cursing, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Sassy Peter Parker, Superhero!Reader, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, couple fights
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-10-07 08:02:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 23,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17362133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: (Y/N) (Y/L/N) has been on the run for years, trying to escape her own powers and the consequences of her actions. When she finds herself in Queens, New York, trying for a normal life, the last thing she expects to do is fall in love. But it isn't that easy when she's a wanted criminal and is constantly destroying the things she loves. When the Avengers get in on the action and (Y/N) is forced to choose between her own wellbeing and the wellbeing of the boy she has come to love, tensions will rise and hard decisions will be made.





	1. Queens

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, and thanks for reading my story! It's my first contribution to Archive of our Own, and I hope everyone likes it. It's also posted on Quotev under my username KILL IT WITH FIRE, and that account has more of the story if you want to read ahead. Leave a comment or a kudo and tell me what you think, but please be nice! You can expect updates every Wednesday morning. :)

        (Y/N) watched as the last cardboard box was unloaded from the moving van and set on the sidewalk by a burly man with unruly red hair and a gruff voice, fiddling with the hem of her hoodie nervously. She thanked him quietly and shook his hand before tipping him. The man hopped into his truck, started the engine, shouted for his associates to hurry up, and roared off in a cloud of black smoke. (Y/N) held up one hand to shield her eyes and squinted. She coughed as the smell of burning tires filled her nose, then turned to look at the small pile of boxes that sat behind her.

        Although the moving service (Y/N) had hired was certainly top notch- meaning they knew where they were going, got there on time, and made sure her stuff did, too- they certainly weren't the best in all departments. According to the three men who had driven out to drop (Y/N)'s belongings off at her new apartment, they only moved the boxes to their new location. They were in no way obliged or required to help her get them into her rooms, which would've been appreciated. Instead, they simply dropped them off at her new apartment in Queens, got paid, and left.

        (Y/N) certainly wasn't weak. In fact, she was pretty much the opposite. But she didn't exactly want to carry all of her boxes up to the eighth story. She couldn't carry it all on her own and that meant she would be leaving several of the boxes outside, totally unprotected. Anybody could take them. (Y/N) couldn't afford to replace her belongings, as she was operating on a tight budget.

        (Y/N) stared at her boxes for a moment, then up at the top story of the brick apartment building. Back down to the boxes. The apartment building. Her eyes gravitated towards the fire escape: a rickety system of interlocking ladders and platforms, made of metal that was slightly rusted. The layer of green paint was rusting, and it wasn't really green anymore. It was sort of... brown. 

        She nodded to herself, muttering a few calculations under her breath before reaching down to grab her boxes. The first one that she took was a small one that had been sealed closed and wrapped with duct tape several times. (Y/N) tucked it carefully under her arm and grabbed a few more shoe-box sized packages, then started up the fire escape. She held onto the railing tightly with one fist, her knuckles practically white. (Y/N) had no interest in falling to her death from four or five stories up.

***

        It took (Y/N) longer than she had expected to get the stack of boxes up to the fire escape that connected to her apartment. The first few trips were easy enough; she took the boxes containing clothing and lighter objects first before moving onto the harder stuff. Thankfully, the previous owners of the apartment had decided to leave some of their furniture, so she didn't have to figure out how to get a table up eight flights of stairs.

        The heaviest box was easily the one that held all of her books. It was about half (Y/N)'s size and had to weigh at least as much as she did. It took a moment for her to figure out how to move it, and another thirty or so to get it up the stairs. (Y/N) ended up deciding to drag it backwards and rest on each landing before moving it up again.

        (Y/N) sighed in relief when she looked down at the concrete sidewalk, eight stories below, and there were no more boxes. She reached into the pocket of her backpack and pulled out her keychain, to which about twenty keys were attached. She sifted through them for a moment before finding the correct one: a small silver key with a dark blue rubber cover on the head to help her identify it.

        (Y/N) inserted the key in the lock and twisted, having to jump over the pile of boxes to reach it. She pushed the door open and stepped inside, nervously looking around. 

        The apartment was neat and clean, with shiny hardwood floors and polished countertops in the kitchen. The walls were all a soft gray-blue color, like the feathers on a pigeon's wing. It was sparsely decorated; the living room held only a couch, a coffee table, a small bookshelf, and a floor lamp, which didn't take up much of the space that (Y/N) had been given to work with.

        The small bathroom was clean and totally empty, but it was obvious that its previous owners had taken special care to keep it neat and have it ready for her.

        The bedroom (or, that's what (Y/N) assumed it was designated to be) was completely empty except for a bare mattress tucked into a corner. There was a closed door on one side of the room which, upon further inspection, led to a closet. Two windows on the side opposite the rest of the apartment let in lots of natural light- not that there was much of it, seeing as it was almost seven o'clock at night. The movers had taken their time.

        The kitchen was the last room in the house, containing the door that led out into the building. It was simple enough, with a gas stove, a microwave, an oven, a dishwasher, and a refrigerator. The counter stretched around half of the room, made of black marble. There were a few cabinets that (Y/N) would only be able to reach if she stood on top of the counters, and when she did, she discovered that they were all empty. So was the fridge, although a few pots and pans had been left behind.

        (Y/N) set to the task of unpacking her boxes. She only had one night to try and get everything ready, because she would be starting school the next day. (Y/N) would be attending Midtown School of Science and Technology because of how well she had done at her old school in those subjects. She was especially interested in inventing tech that she could use for her various... odd jobs, you could call them.

        (Y/N) turned on all the lights in the apartment, generating a soft glow the color of buttercups. She started by pulling all of her boxes inside, leaving them in the living room, and closing the back door. On second thought, she locked it and checked to see if the front door was secure. (Y/N) went around the small apartment, checking each nook and cranny to make sure nothing had been planted prior to her arrival.

        Once she was satisfied, (Y/N) started to sort through her belongings and put them away. She opened the box labeled "Kitchen" in scrawled black sharpie and unpacked it. Sadly, there was no food in the box, only things that could be used to make food. Pots, pans, cooking utensils, that sort of stuff. 

        (Y/N) cut through the rest of the boxes and delivered their contents to the right places until there was only one box left: the first one she had taken up, the one that had been wrapped securely in duct tape several times. 

        (Y/N) pulled out a pocket knife and gently started to cut through the layers of tape and cardboard, biting her lip as she worked diligently. She couldn't afford to accidentally nick the contents and mess them up, because they were extremely pressure sensitive and she didn't want to risk a small explosion. That was exactly what would happen if (Y/N) messed up: a reaction that could destroy the entire apartment building.

        Fortunately, once the box had been opened and discarded, (Y/N) was out of the woods- at least, for the time being. She kicked the empty cardboard package aside with a bare foot and held up her suit, smoothing out any wrinkles.

        (Y/N)' slipped into the bathroom to change, slipping out of her normal clothing before changing into the suit and turning to the mirror- a full-length number on the opposite side of the small room- and making sure it fit her right.

        Unlike some other superheroes who went for both style and substance as separate factors, (Y/N) had ended up figuring out how to meld those two important parts together. The suit was simple: made of black spandex with (f/c) streaks running down the sides and the back, it had been designed specifically for the purpose of being able to withstand the intense electromagnetic pulses and charges that (Y/N) was able to produce. The shoulders and knees were slightly padded, but not in a noticeable way. A thin sheet of strong foam had been sewn into the lining of the suit to avoid any injuries. 

        The mask was designed in the sleek style of a motorcycle helmet, made of a simple plastic and reinforced with a mix of kevlar and carbon-fiber. The inside was padded with foam that matched the (f/c) streaks on her suit. The visor was tinted black and contained a small computer screen on one side that helped (Y/N) monitor the strength of her pulses so she could avoid hurting herself. It collapsed into a two-dimensional square of plastic with the push of a button for easier storage, so (Y/N) didn't have to lug a motorcycle helmet around to all of her classes.

        (Y/N) reached into the helmet and pulled out a small black earpiece, fitting it to her ear and testing it quickly with a voice command.

        "Mick, wake up."

        Mick, or AEDS, was the form of artificial intelligence that (Y/N) had been using ever since she was eight or nine and had been going through a Disney phase. She had named it after Mickey Mouse, but its real name, AEDS, stood for Automatic Emergency Default Support. Mick had been (Y/N)'s number one source of comfort and counseling when she was younger, and she continued to rely on it- or him- during her day-to-day missions. 

        Mick had been programmed by (Y/N) herself with the assistance of a website and one of her teachers. She had given him the voice of a teenage boy and the personality of a big brother, which had always helped her through rough times, seeing as she was an only child. Mick was self-aware and tended to know what was going on, but he was still a machine. He wasn't a real friend by any means, and (Y/N) usually left him at home.

        "Programming waking up," a male voice said. "AEDS activated. Hello, (Y/N)."

        "Hey, Mick," (Y/N) said with a relieved voice. It was a miracle that he hadn't been damaged in the bumpy ride. "Shut down. Battery-saving software activated."

        Once the loud beep that signified a shut down had sounded, (Y/N) removed the earpiece and set it in the bathroom drawer. She pulled her normal clothes on over her suit- a pair of black jeans and a blue hoodie- and pressed the button on her helmet, causing it to collapse into the square of black plastic again. She reached under her hoodie and slipped it into a storage pocket in her suit, then turned off the bathroom lights and left the room.

        (Y/N)'s stay in Queens, New York was certainly going to be an interesting one, there was no doubt about that.


	2. One Last Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter with some background and a little bit of filling.

It took (Y/N) a few minutes to realize that she probably needed to run to a grocery store and pick up something for dinner, seeing as she didn't have any food in her apartment and, regardless of her superhuman abilities, still needed to eat. She didn't have a car or any other way of traveling, like a bike, so she ended up just pulling her boots on and tucking her (h/c) hair under a knit cap.

(Y/N) grabbed her backpack, the one object- other than her suit, of course- that she carried everywhere. She slung it over one shoulder.

In (Y/N)'s old town, Chicago, she wouldn't have had any qualms about wearing her suit and helmet out in the open. She had been the neighborhood superhero, Pulse. But she had no interest in being recognized in Queens.

(Y/N) grabbed her keys and slipped them into the mesh side pocket of her bag, then turned all of the lights off in her apartment except for the ones in the kitchen so she would be able to make sure nobody was waiting in ambush when she returned. She unlocked the front door and started on her way down the stairs.

The apartment building in itself was nice enough, with warm lights that were set in sconces between each door. The floors were covered in an ancient carpet, but it was obvious that somebody cared enough to vacuum it once in a while and try to keep it clean. The doors that led to separate apartments were spaced out nicely enough for the sort of neighborhood (Y/N) had ended up moving into.

The sector of Queens that she had chosen was notorious for high crime and homicide rates. Muggings, murders, assaults, and the works. Nothing (Y/N) couldn't take care of on her own. It wasn't too hard to deal with the smaller crimes, fortunately, because that was what she was best at. Looking out for the little people instead of taking care of the world shaking events. It wasn't that she couldn't, just that she preferred to make sure the citizens were safe before moving on to bigger things. Besides, the New York area already had the Avengers to take care of any giant problems.

***

(Y/N) was on edge the entire time she walked to the local supermarket. She twitched at every sound, whether it was a car roaring past or a cat jumping out of a trash can. There was an odd sensation in the pit of her stomach; it was a mix of fear and tense excitement. She couldn't help it. Queens was new to her, but she still couldn't wait to start getting to work and helping around. The high points of (Y/N)'s life tended to be the satisfactory feeling that she got after saving somebody's life, whether it was from a car accident, a mugging, or a natural disaster. Of course, there were always those times where she didn't succeed...

(Y/N) pushed the dark thought out of her mind and decided to focus on her surroundings; she was trying to get to know her new hometown. The streets were dark, even though it wasn't very late. Streetlights shone down from above, hitting the pavement with a velvety glow. They reflected off of the puddles that had formed in potholes and grates from an earlier rainstorm. Drops of water shone on the dashboards of cars and on the shop windows. Queens was beautiful at night.

The supermarket was located four or five blocks away from (Y/N)'s apartment, which was a bit of a lucky break. She had been expecting to have to walk quite a bit farther. Everything was almost completely silent, with the occasional sirens ringing in the distance or rustling of leaves. (Y/N) tried to relax as much as she could, because... well, let's just say that she had to keep her emotions under control or bad things would happen.

The supermarket was a small building on the corner of two streets. It was squat and plain, with gray stucco walls and tinted windows. A pair of men sat on a bench beside the front doors, smoking cigarettes and speaking in hushed tones. (Y/N) ignored them and entered.

A bell dinged above her as the door closed and opened. From somewhere back in the room, behind the rows of shelves, someone shouted a muffled, halfhearted greeting. (Y/N) returned it as politely as she could before grabbing a cart and starting to peruse the aisles.

It didn't take long for her to get everything she had to. Her needs were simple enough: some sort of fruit that looked like it wasn't about to die, cereal, milk that was within its expiration date, pasta, and a few other food items. (Y/N) rolled her cart up to the front counter, payed as quickly as she could before thanking the cashier and leaving.

Carting her bags home was not fun. They weren't particularly heavy, but then again, (Y/N) wasn't particularly strong. Her strengths lied elsewhere.

With three or four bags in each hand and a watchful eye, (Y/N) started on her way home. Her shoulders were aching by the time she reached the front door of the apartment building, and she was ready to go inside and make sure she was ready for the next day, but something caught her eye.

A box full of discarded newspapers from the day before sat beside the door, soggy from the rain so that some of the words were bleeding together and the paper itself was partially transparent. The front picture was one of a figure crouched in front of the camera, one hand contorted into an odd symbol and the other holding onto what seemed to be a white rope. They wore a red and blue suit with a black symbol on the chest, and there were two white eye-shaped pieces of fabric on the face.

(Y/N) bent down and picked up a single issue, squinting in the dim light to try and make anything out. Unfortunately, the paper was too far gone and she couldn't see what any of the words meant. She dropped it back into the box with a wet plop and opened the door to the apartment building, closing it behind her.

(Y/N) made her way through the nearly-empty lobby to the stairwell and started on her way up the eight flights of stairs. It took her about ten minutes to reach her apartment- number 47- and unlock the door. By then, her legs were cramping and most of the feeling in her fingers was gone because of the plastic bags. (Y/N) placed the bags on the kitchen counter, checked the rooms for any intruders, and turned on all of the lights. She was the only person in the apartment, to her relief.

After unpacking the bags and putting her groceries away, (Y/N) placed a pot of water on the stove and started bringing it to a boil. She grabbed her laptop off of her mattress and booted it up, then sat down on the couch and stared at the screen with narrowed eyes.

(Y/N)'s mind was racing. She couldn't stop thinking about the person on the cover of the newspaper. They looked like the superhero type of person, and (Y/N) was wondering who they actually were and where they were located.

She started to type random code words into her computer's search bar: superhero brought up a ton of stuff about the Avengers, but nothing about the stranger in the suit. Black symbol on suit brought up numerous gang symbols. Blue and red brought up a few hundred variations of the American flag. It was only once (Y/N) tried superhero, blue and red suit, black symbol, Queens that she actually got real results.

(Y/N) clicked on the first article that popped up- a news website dated two hours earlier- and started to read, scanning every line as if her life depended on the information on the screen.

**_Arachnid-themed Superhero appears again in a feat of bravery_ **

**_Most of the citizens of Queens and the surrounding area are well aware of the hero who has been working to save them for a few years now. It's difficult to ignore the amazing Spiderman, after all. The masked man has been the only superhero in the New York area as of late who has particularly present lately, a fact of which I'm sure we are all aware._ **

**_Dressed in a skin-tight blue and red bodysuit with his trademark spider insignia, Spiderman tends to appear when we least expect it and do good. We at the staff of the Queens Gazette have been particularly invested in the goings on with the Avengers and our own superhero since the very beginning. Since we started writing about Spiderman a year earlier, we have received multiple requests for more articles about him._ **

**_The last Spiderman sighting was two days ago, when he stopped a mugging in one of the Queens neighborhoods, resulting in three arrests and two saved lives. The convicted perpetrators- Marcel Adams, Steven Adams, and Rebecca Adams- will serve three years jail time on the charges of attempted assault and burglary. They were retrieved by our local police after the masked hero called the station to report a crime. He remained to take questions and explain the situation afterwards, although the answers that we received were certainly very vague._ **

**_No injuries were reported in this encounter on the sides of the felons or the would-be victims, all thanks to our local hero. We hope to do some more reporting on him soon and will update you when possible._ **

**_Written by Lea Martinez, Editor in Chief of the Queens Gazette_ **

(Y/N) furrowed her brow and read over the article one more time before she heard an odd bubbling noise and looked over to the stove, only to realize that the water had hit a rolling boil minutes earlier and was spilling over the sides of the pot. With a strangled curse, (Y/N) slammed her computer shut and hurdled to her feet, grabbing a towel from the sink and trying in vain to mop up the mess without injuring herself. She yelped, yanking one hand back when she realized that she hadn't turned the stove off and the towel was on fire.

(Y/N) dropped the burning piece of cloth in the sink and turned the water on. She turned around to turn the stove off, sighing in relief when the flames hissed and disappeared with a fwoosh.

Yeah, this was going to be great.


	3. Midtown

        (Y/N)  had a firm grip on one strap of her backpack as she walked through the busy streets of Queens to her new school, Midtown School of Science and Technology. She was technically there on a scholarship, which meant she had to be perfectly on time for each class and would need to have perfect grades if she wanted to stay. And (Y/N) wasn't planning on going anywhere else any time soon, so she definitely wasn't going to mess up.

        (Y/N) stopped for a moment when she neared the school area and was within a short enough distance to see any activity that was going on. There was a large crowd of teenagers gathered around the front doors. They were loud, that was for sure. Jostling each other, pushing others down the stairs, and laughing racously. Pretty much what every high school was expected to look like. Most of them were dressed down in jeans and casual clothing, but (Y/N) noticed a few blazers and ties mixed in with the crowd. 

        (Y/N) bit her lip, almost drawing blood as she watched the mass of teens with narrowed eyes. She wasn't sure if it was a good idea to put herself in that sort of situation. And by "that sort of situation" she meant one that could result in a full reveal of her powers.

        (Y/N) had discovered after many years of experimentation that, although her pulses could be controlled on a whim and didn't seem to run out, one of the most dangerous triggers for the electricity was a stressful situation. She wouldn't have described herself as shy- even though that was exactly what she was- but (Y/N) wasn't the sort of person who liked to interact with other people. Loud noises tended to overwhelm her, and this could cause breakdowns and random releases of energy that could do anything from interuppting a phone call to burning down the entire city of New York.

        But (Y/N) wasn't going to miss out on the chance to try for a normal- or at least partly  normal- life. She reached under her jacket to feel the spot that concealed her folded up helmet, which had become a mannerism that kept popping up when she was afraid. (Y/N)'s fingers brushed over the hard square. She breathed a sigh of relief, reached back to make sure her backpack was closed, and started towards the school.

        Most of the students didn't seem to take notice that (Y/N) existed. They didn't look up from their conversations as she walked through their midst, her eyes fixed on the ground. They were too absorbed in their own lives to notice someone out of the ordinary. (Y/N) used it to her advantage, trying to be as innocuous as possible to avoid drawing unwanted attention. But it obviously didn't work all the way, because she could feel a pair of eyes on the back of her head. (Y/N) didn't bother turning around; she had been expecting it. She knew from experience that the new kid was going to get stared at and it was simply a fact of life. Middle schools and high schools alike.

***

        Peter Parker was focused on skimming a few pages of notes before a big presentation that he had to make for his mechanics class, so he didn't notice (Y/N) at first. He was sitting off to the side under a large tree with a textbook balanced precariously on one knee and his spiral-bound notebook in his free hand. Peter held a pencil between his teeth and furrowed his brow, trying to make sure his notes were accurate. In fact, he was so focused that he didn't see Ned until the other boy was so close he could almost trip over him.

        Peter jumped as Ned's shadow fell across his papers. Expecting to see someone like Flash Thompson when he looked up, he breathed out a sigh of relief when he saw that it was only his friend.

        Ned Leeds was an... interesting character. That was for sure. At sixteen or seventeen years old, he had developed an obsession with Legos and Star Wars. He was a member of the Academic Decathlon team and was very talented with technology, although he was definitely a bit naive. And he wasn't exactly the best at avoiding the bullies of Midtown. But he was certainly a great sidekick, and Peter knew it.

        Ned had known about Peter's escapades as Spiderman for a few days, ever since the latter had been roped into building a Lego Death Star at his apartment. Ned had walked in to see Peter hanging from the ceiling, upside-down, in his Spiderman suit. Peter could have bounced back from the first two with a couple of convincing lies and a quick call to Tony Stark, but the suit? That was pretty hard to bluff his way out of. He had tried to tell Ned that it was just a costume, but he was hanging from the ceiling. Ned didn't have to work too hard to figure out what was true and what wasn't.

        Ned had proven to be a pretty awesome ally to have, even though he could be a bit insufferable at times and certainly wasn't that super. He was supportive and excitable; the first days he had known about the whole Peter-is-Spiderman sort of thing had been filled with questions about the Avengers and what Peter could do with his powers. Ned had also asked if he could be Peter's man in the chair, which apparently meant that he would be working behind the scenes with screens and stuff like that to make sure Peter didn't die. The hero normally would've called that the back-up guy, but he wasn't about to argue with Ned, who seemed so happy about his new position in the safekeeping of Queens.

        Ned crouched down beside his friend and clapped a hand onto his shoulder, causing the other boy to jump in surprise. Peter dropped his textbook onto the ground and accidentaly spit his pencil out. It flew across the area only to be trampled under a pair of feet.

        Peter turned up to look at Ned, already opening his mouth to spout a few annoyed- and probably half-hearted, seeing as he could never bring himself to really hurt Ned- rebukes. Ned cut him off before he could speak.

        "Dude, did you see the new kid?" He asked, his voice full of the same child-like excitement as always. "Did you? Did you? Did you?"

        "No, Ned," Peter muttered. "I didn't see the new kid. Is that why you interrupted me? We get plenty of new kids already, what's so different about this one?"

        "It's a gu-url," Ned drawled, grinning as he watched Peter's face for any reaction. He didn't get one, and the disappointment was obviously on his face.

        "So? There are plenty of girls at Midtown."

        "Yeah. But she's pretty."

        "Then go ahead and hit on her, I don't care."

        "But Peter... please come see."

        "No, Ned. She's a human being, not an exhibit in a zoo. And she's probably nervous enough without us ogling her, seeing as it's her first day. Besides, I'm studying."

        "Fine," Ned replied. He plopped down next to Peter and picked up the fallen textbook, flipping through the pages and scanning the words. "What are you studying?"

        "Notes. On my mechanics presentation."

        "And how's that going?"

        "I'm dying inside, my soul is disentegrating, and I think I'm going to cry. So it's going great, obviously. The usual."

        "Aw, you'll be fine. Let's go so we don't end up being late. And maybe you'll see the new girl on the way!"

        "Yeah, Ned." Peter sighed and started to pack up his books. "Maybe."

***

        (Y/N) kept her eyes glued to the ground as she made her way through the nearly-empty halls of Midtown High. Most of the students were out front or already in their classes, which was certainly helpful for (Y/N). She didn't have to worry about being overcrowded and losing control or anything like that.

        It took a few minutes for her to find the office. (Y/N) sighed in relief as she saw the plaque on the door and opened it, stepping into the room and looking around. A woman was sitting at a desk with a stack of papers and a pen in her hands. 

        (Y/N) crossed the small space. She cleared her throat nervously to get the woman's attention, pulling a small packet of information out of a folder in her backpack. The woman looked up. A warm smile crossed over her face as she saw (Y/N).

        "Hi," (Y/N) said quietly. She held out the papers, her hand shaking. "I'm new. My name is-"

        "(Y/N), right?" The woman asked in a very peppy, overinthusiastic voice. "Oh, it's so great to meet you! I've got all of your schoolwork and binders right here, since you're starting in the middle of the year and you have some make up work to do. Some of your teachers won't be making you do all of it, because that would leave you with a truckload of papers to deal with. You'll have to share books with another student in a few of your classes; the teacher will specify what you will and won't do. And you're here on a scholarship, is that right?"

        "Yes, ma'am," (Y/N) replied. "Mechanics, inventing, technology, and physical science."

        "Ah, that'll be fun. We've only got a few students here on inventing and mechanics scholarships. It'll be interesting to see what you guys come up with this year. I think there's actually a presentation today, so you can see what your competition will be like."         

        (Y/N) found that the woman talked so much that she didn't even have to answer, which was a reassuring revelation for her. She could just stand there and nod at the appropriate times.

        "We've found a student that, based on your previous track record, will be perfectly suited to show you around. Her name is-"

        A knock on the door cut the talkative woman off. If it was possible, she smiled even wider and turned to (Y/N).

        "Yes, that'll be her right now. Go ahead and let her in, darling, and we'll let the two of you get to know each other."

        (Y/N) nodded and opened the door, peering out with wide eyes as a taller girl with curly black hair and gorgeous skin walked through the doorway into the office. She was pretty, and part of her hair curled over her right eye.

        "You're the new girl." It wasn't a question.

        "Yeah. (Y/N)."

        "Michelle. I'm supposed to show you around and make sure you don't get lost. Nice to meet you."

        "Y-you, too."

        "Well," the woman said, looking back and forth between Michelle and (Y/N) like she was watching a tennis match. "I'm sure the two of you will be great friends. Michelle, go ahead and show (Y/N) to her first class. Come and see me later if you have any questions, darling."

        (Y/N) nodded and followed Michelle out of the office. She watched as the other girl walked ahead of her for a bit without looking back, then stopped at the water fountain. 

        "You comin', (Y/N)?" Michelle asked, raising an eyebrow. "We have to get you to class."

        "Y-yeah," (Y/N) replied. "I'm coming."  
        (Y/N)'s first few classes went by relatively well, considering the circumstances. Michelle wasn't the most talkative person, but than again, neither was (Y/N). They sat next to each other during class so Michelle could bring (Y/N) up to date on everything they were studying. First period was geometry, which she excelled at and was able to catch up with the notes rather quickly. Second period was English Language Arts. Anything involving grammar and writing certainly wasn't (Y/N)'s strong suit, as she was more mathmatically and physically inclined due to her training, but she obviously wasn't going to flunk the class. She needed to keep her grades at high B's or above to stay on scholarship, and she could already see that there may have been a bit of an issue there.

        Ever since (Y/N) had started hero work in her early tweens, about four or five years ago, she had ended up having a couple of problems with her grades. School took up most of her mornings and normally stretched to mid-afternoons, Pulse could take from the minute she left school- or even earlier; if (Y/N) caught wind of a crime being committed she would leave, regardless of the consequences- to well after midnight, and if she got any sleep, it would be from the time she got home to five in the morning. Sometimes, (Y/N) just collapsed on her bed or the couch, whichever was closer, without changing into her suit. She didn't even bother to clean the blood off of her face at times. 

        All of this was contributing to the fact that (Y/N) had very little time to study and do homework, which was making it difficult for her to stay in school. She couldn't afford to pay for an education, as she was too busy for a job and didn't have a guardian to provide it for her, so she had to go on scholarships. And (Y/N) wasn't planning on dropping any time soon. But, if forced to choose between her education and social life or her hero work, she would choose heroism. That was just the kind of person she was.

        The class that (Y/N) was the most excited for had to be the science class that came right after a short break, because she knew for a fact- having been confirmed by the peppy woman at the front desk, who's name turned out to be Ellen Fornelli- that they were studying inventions and machines. This happened to be one of (Y/N)'s favorite subjects, seeing as she had made her own helmet and suit.

***

        Peter and Ned walked side-by-side through the busy hallway, trying to avoid being stepped on by larger students. The passage was filled with laughter and loud voices. A few teenage girls pushed past them, practically screeching with laughter as they made their way to their next class. Peter glared at the swinging ponytail on the back of the lead girl's head, glowering angrily.

        "Would it be that hard for them to slow down?" He muttered, turning to face Ned as they walked. "I mean, they can't be in that much of a hurry. Geez."

        Ned shrugged, rolling his eyes slightly. "I dunno, man. Maybe- there she is!"

        He pointed across the hallway excitedly. Honestly, nearly every thing that kid did was in an excited manner. Peter sighed, not wanting to look like a creep to the new girl, who didn't know about his track record with bullying. He craned his neck and followed the direction that Ned was pointing in as surreptitiously as he could. It was immediately obvious who Ned was talking about.

        The new girl was definitely very pretty, with (h/c) hair that was pulled back in a sleek ponytail, a few stray strands tucked behind her ears. She had shiny (e/c) eyes that were downcast. Her eyebrows were furrowed and her lips were pursed into one line. She was reading over a piece of paper, flipping it over several times before re-reading it and biting her lip. The girl seemed confused.

        "I think she's lost," Ned murmured. "You should go help her, Peter."

        "What, you don't want to try?" Peter asked, smirking. "She doesn't know anything about either one of us."

        "Yeah, but..." He gestured towards the new girl with a hopeless expression on his face. "Look at her, Peter. She wouldn't go for me. C'mon, just try! I'll go with you."

        "I don't know... I have to get to class."

        "So does she. And if you don't help, she's going to miss. Come on, man, don't be a coward. Please?"

        Peter looked back and forth between the girl and his friend, who was looking at him with a ginourmous pair of puppy dog eyes. He shook his head, exasperated, and chucked Ned on the shoulder.

        "Fine. I'll do it, but just because I don't want her to end up with a detention on her first day. You have to come with me, though. Okay?"

        "Sure."

        Peter and Ned crossed the hallway, shoving through tightly-knit groups of teenagers to get to where the girl was standing. She had her back up against a wall of lockers and was holding a stack of textbooks. A pencil was perched behing her right ear precariously. It looked like it was going to fall off if she moved.

        The girl looked up when she heard the two boys approaching. She tilted her head to one side, biting her lip and trying for a small smile. Peter was taken aback by the expression on her face; she looked absolutely terrified.

        "Hey," he said politely, holding one hand out. "I'm Peter Parker. This is my friend, Ned Leeds."

        She shook it firmly. "My name is (Y/N) (Y/L/N). It's nice to meet you."

        "You too. Sorry to bother you, but Ned noticed that you looked a bit lost."

        "Yeah. Someone was showing me around, but she had to leave. Something about a dentist's appointment. So I don't really know where I'm going... I'm new; this is my first day here."

        "Cool. Did you move here from one of the public schools, or...?"

        "Nah. I'm from Chicago, just moved to Queens. Yesterday, actually."

        "Cool!" Ned piped up. "Was Chicago nice?"

        "It was okay, I guess. Pretty loud, just like here. Lots of crime. So pretty similar to Queens, actually."

        "That's so-"

        Peter cut Ned off, knowing that he was going to start fanboying over (Y/N) and would probably scare her off. Although she didn't look as terrified as she had been when they had first seen her, she was obviously still nervous.

        "Yeah, Ned, it's cool. Do you need any help getting around to your classes? I have a few minutes before my next course, so I could take you to yours if you wanted."

        "Yeah, actually. That would be great," (Y/N) said. She smiled at Peter, a quirky little half-smirk that sent a bubbling feeling through his stomach that he couldn't figure out. "Thanks."

        "No problem. What's your next class?"        

        (Y/N) checked her schedule again before answering. "It's a science class. Something about inventions and mechanics, I guess. Any ideas?"

        Peter grinned, slightly taken aback. "That's our next class. We'll walk you there. Right, Ned?"

        "Sure, of course!" Ned exclaimed. "That sounds great!"

        (Y/N) narrowed her eyes at Ned, but not aggressively. She seemed more amused at his antics. After a few seconds of silence, a small grin spread across her face.

        "It does, doesn't it?"

***

        Peter and Ned walked (Y/N) to the science room. The latter was talking a mile a minute the entire time, obviously ecstatic that he had found someone who was so polite to him. (Y/N) answered his questions and chatted amicably, but Peter noticed that she avoided replying to anything that had something to do with her past. She either changed the subject entirely, shrugged, or became very quiet and distant. After the fourth uncomfortable pause, Peter sent a warning glare in Ned's direction to tell him to knock it off. Fortunately, he seemed to get the hint. The personal questions stopped, changing to more harmless inquiries about what (Y/N) liked to do in her free time. 

        Peter noticed that, again, she was quite vague about her life. She didn't seem to be a very interesting person, seeing as she didn't do much else than school and hang out at her house. Peter could tell that she was trying to hide something, but he didn't pry. He understood wanting to have secrets and knowing how annoying it could be when somebody pushed too hard to get answers.

        When they got to the science room, it was almost completely empty. Peter and Ned invited (Y/N) to sit with them at their usual table in the back. They hadn't been expecting an affirmitive answer, but that's exactly what they got, to their surprise. Ned sat on one side and (Y/N) took the stool next to Peter.

        She pulled out a spiral-bound notebook with a (f/c) colored cover and grabbed a pencil. (Y/N) hunched over her paper and began to sketch, scrabbling out equations at random. She bit her lip as the sound of lead on paper filled the air.

        Peter didn't want to seem like he was snooping, but he couldn't seem to squash down his curiosity. He was slightly taller than (Y/N) and could see over her shoulder to the paper, but he did have to stretch a bit. All he could make out was a neat column of mathematical equations and inequalities that looked relatively complicated.

        (Y/N) seemed to notice a presence behind her. She turned around, her (e/c) eyes meeting Peter's brown ones. He blushed, embarassed to have been caught spying. But (Y/N) didn't get angry, she just smiled and moved slightly so he could see better.

        "What are these for?" Peter asked curiously. 

        "Just a little project of mine. I like inventing stuff."

        "Anything in specific?"

        "Not really. Just... tech that I can use in different situations. It's not really that good, though."

        "Looks pretty good to me. That's a difficult equation right there; I can't even figure out what you're making."

        (Y/N) smiled, giggling quietly. "I don't really know what it's going to be like, either. I'm still figuring that out myself."

        Peter returned the smile. "I bet it'll be awesome, whatever it turns out to be."

        "Thanks."

        Peter didn't know why (Y/N) was giving him such an odd feeling. He had never really had it before. It wasn't a crush, because he recognized having that sensation when he looked at Liz Toomes and this certainly didn't match. It was weird, and he couldn't identify it. (Y/N) was a mysterious person. Peter found himself wanting to learn more about her. Maybe even become one of her friends.


	4. The First Encounter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hella long chapter. If you like it, tell me. If you think it's better short, tell me that, too. Thanks for all the positive feedback!

Peter kept his eyes on (Y/N) for the majority of their class. It may have sounded creepy, but he felt like he had an obligation to watch her. He knew nothing about her and kept noticing new details that he hadn't seen before, like the way her feet didn't touch the floor under her stool or how she was constantly doodling in the margins of her papers, staring at the whiteboard absentmindedly.

        One of the most interesting things that he had noticed, however, was the fact that (Y/N) wore a pair of black gloves. They looked simple enough, designed in the standard 'motorcycle' style, with pads of what looked like carbon fiber protecting her knuckles and the back of her hand. A small (f/c) dot of color sat in the center of each pad like an emblem. (Y/N) kept spasming her fingers so that they tapped against her palm; it seemed to be like a nervous habit.

        (Y/N) turned her head to look at Peter, tilting it to one side and flaring her eyebrows when she noticed that he had already been watching her. He flushed red, whipping back around to face forwards and pretending that he had been paying attention to the teacher the entire time.

        The lesson that they were trying to cover at the time was covering the subject of correct measurements in the solid aspects of inventions and how to properly connect a circuitboard. The last lesson had been about coding, which Peter hadn't enjoyed at all, and the next was supposed to be filled by an inventing project that he was looking forward to. 

        (Y/N) watched Peter for a moment, trying to figure out if he had been looking at her or if she had caught him at an inopportune time. When he didn't turn around for over a minute, she shrugged and turned back to the board.

        The Proffessor, a man named Mr. Winsworth, was scribbling out an equation that looked rather similar to the one that she had been working on earlier. (Y/N) had been using it to find the correct volume for kevlar reinforcements in her suit. She needed the material to be thick enough to protect her from the many hits she took but thin enough so that it didn't hinder any of her movement. Her general goal was to get it in there without being able to tell that anything had changed.

        "Ms. (Y/N), please come up to the board and complete this equation for me," Mr. Winsworth said. He gestured towards the whiteboard with a dry erase marker, raising an eyebrow. He obviously didn't think (Y/N) had been paying attention. 

        (Y/N) nodded and stood up, having to struggle to get off of the high stool before making her way to the front of the classroom. She took the marker and stared at the letters and numbers for a moment before touching the marker to the board and starting to fill in any blanks that she could find. After she looked over the equation a few times, she erased some of the figures that Mr. Winsworth had written out and replaced them with the figures that she had been using. Muttering erupted behind her and Mr. Winsworth seemed shocked, but nobody tried to stop (Y/N). 

        Peter watched with wide eyes as the new girl corrected the teacher silently. Her expresssion was just as neutral as always; (Y/N) almost looked bored. Peter's mouth was half-open in shock. He had no idea if (Y/N) actually knew what she was doing or if she was just bluffing, because what she was writing up on the board looked incredibly complicated. If she was correct... well, it would be really impressive.

        Mr. Winsworth pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil and began to follow (Y/N)'s actions, checking behind her. With every word, his eyes widened even more.

        (Y/N) finally stepped away from the board, capping the marker and returning it to Mr. Winsworth's desk. She extended a hand in the direction of her equation, which had taken up over half of the space that she had been given to work with. (Y/N)'s eyes were downcast and her cheeks were flushed slightly.

        "That... that's correct," Mr. Winsworth stammered. "Thank you."

        (Y/N) nodded and returned to her stool, keeping her gaze fixed firmly on the ground until she was seated. Peter held up one hand for a high five and (Y/N) obliged. Peter could feel the pads in her gloves colliding with his palm, which was an odd feeling. But he loved the sensation of (Y/N)'s fingers against his skin.

***

        The next class passed quickly enough, fortunately for both Peter and (Y/N). It was another class that they shared- literature- and they sat together again. (Y/N) spent most of her time doodling letters and numbers in the margins of her paper, just like she had in her science class. She was shy and answered every question quietly and quickly, to the point where the teacher had to ask her to speak up because she couldn't be heard from the front of the class.

        Lunch was an hour-long period. The cafeteria was loud and full of boisterous teenagers, to the dismay of (Y/N). She followed Ned and Peter to their usual seats at one of the tables, her hands curled into fists as she tried to manage the power that was inside her. She could feel a pulse building up in her core, heat spreading through her limbs like a wildfire. (Y/N) bit her lip as she sat down at one of the benches and unhooked her backpack.

        "Are you okay?" Peter asked, sitting beside her with a tray in his hands. "(Y/N), is something wrong?"

        "No," (Y/N) replied calmly. She pulled herself back under control and felt the power ebbing away like waves lapping at sand. With a sigh of relief, (Y/N) relaxed. "No, nothing's wrong. I'm just a little bit tired. Sorry."

        "No problem. Do you not drink coffee?"

        (Y/N) shook her head. Caffeine was another thing that made her tick and could trigger her powers. Something about the chemicals reacting with the makeup of her energy and multiplying in a way that made it very hard to control. She had never actually had a Coca-Cola, a coffee, or any of that kind of stuff. 

        "Did you sleep badly?"

        "Well, it was my first night in Queens and I didn't get to bed until late because I had to unpack... sorry."

        "Why are you sorry?" Peter asked, surprise showing clearly in his voice. "I don't think you did anything..."

        "Oh. I thought I was talking too much," (Y/N) said. She blushed, looking down at the table with an embarassed expression on her face. "Not used to social interaction."

        "No, it's okay," Peter replied. His mind was racing. Why would (Y/N) worry about something as silly as talking too much? Ned talked waaaay too much, and nobody was stopping him. "And you weren't talking too much. Don't worry about it."

        "S-sounds good. So... what do you like to do after school?" (Y/N) asked, obviously trying to get a bit of a conversation started and avoid an awkward pause.

        "I'm on the Decathlon team. I don't really do much other than that, thought. Ned and I hang out sometimes after school. A lot, actually. I study. I'm kind of boring." Peter laughed, shaking his head.

        "I don't think that sounds boring. Sort of fun, actually."

        "I guess. So, do you live with your parents?"

        A spear of pain stabbed through (Y/N)'s chest. She winced, shaking her head. "No. They're... they're traveling right now. I haven't really seen them in a while. A couple of years."

        It was a lie. A blatant lie. But (Y/N) couldn't tell him about her real life yet; he wouldn't be able to take it. Peter would probably end up thinking she was insane or telling the police about her situation or something, and then she would be in real trouble. And (Y/N) couldn't afford that sort of an issue.

        "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know. Who do you live with?"

        "Er... my uncle."

        Yet another lie. (Y/N) could feel her heart sinking as she messed up yet another friendship. Her only consolation was that, since her job was so dangerous, there was a chance she would be killed, end up moving away, or disappear mysteriously at any point in her stay in New York. The kids at Midtown, in time, would forget about the quirky, quiet girl with the weird personality.

        "If it's any consolation, my parents died when I was little. I live with my aunt in an apartment," Peter said in a hushed voice. 

        "I'm sorry."

        "It's okay. We're both sort of the same, I guess, right?"

        "Yeah."

        No. No, Peter, you don't understand. We couldn't be any more different than we are, and when you find out why, you'll hate me. You'll find out what I've done and what's happened because of me, and you're going to despise me when it happens. I'm going to lose you, just like I lose everyone else. You'll see.

***

        Peter and (Y/N) made it through the entire day without a single incident, which was pretty much a miracle. (Y/N) was quiet, per the norm, but Peter was such a nice person that it was hard not to open up to him. He kept starting up conversations and asking her questions when they were taking breaks. He was very likeable, which was concerning to (Y/N). Peter kept getting too close to her secrets and she just couldn't deal with it.

        Fortunately, (Y/N) got her break at the end of the day when she was walking home. She had already said good-bye to Peter and Ned, who were staying late at school for a Decathlon practice or something. (Y/N) was about halfway back to her house, walking through the crowds of people on a large street, when a crowd around the TV store caught her eye.

        (Y/N) pushed through the mass to get to the front, already perking up. And there it was: her ideal rescue situation. The filickering screens in front of her showed a group of people being held captive in a subway station for money by what looked like a gang. The police couldn't get in for the fear of losing control and causing a death. The gang was armed with automatic weapons, and it looked like a few casualties had already been caused. A pair of bodies was pushed off to the side and the crowd of captives was practically fighting each other to get away.

        The people around (Y/N) muttered among themselves worriedly, obviously terrified about what was going to happen. A few individuals recognized family members in the hostage situation and started to cry, their sobs ringing out through the crowd.

        (Y/N) didn't waste another moment. She turned and shoved through the crowd, trying to get away. There was a bit of resistance and some cursing but she ended up making it out with only a stepped-on foot. With a determined light in her eye, she set off down the street.

        (Y/N) had a job to do.

***

        The first thing that (Y/N) looked for, as usual, was a secluded area that she could change in. She wouldn't be showing any skin because of the way she always wore her suit under her clothing, but the whole idea of wearing the uniform was to keep her identity under wraps. Changing into one's supersuit in public tends to give away one's secret identity rather easily.

        It wasn't particularly difficult, seeing as every person on the block had gravitated to the television screens and was now watching with wide eyes. (Y/N) slipped into a dark alley, checking first to make sure nobody was hiding out in there. Once she had confirmed that it was empty, (Y/N) dropped her backpack behind a dumpster and stripped out of her sweatshirt and jeans. She unlaced her shoes and tucked them beside her backpack, then took the folded helmet out of her hidden pocket.

        (Y/N) pressed a small button and watched as the helmet spiraled out of its dormant form into the sleek design that she had become so used to. Visor down, she pulled it over her head. THe tinted plexiglass hid her eyes from sight and concealed her identity.

        (Y/N) packed up all of her clothing, shoving it into the pocket of her backpack. She hid it behind a small stack of wooden crates, praying that her belongings would still be there when she returned. There was no way of identifying them, which was both a blessing and a curse; nobody would be able to trace them back to her either way. 

        (Y/N) hesitated for a moment, looking back to her stuff with doubt shining bright in her (e/c) eyes. She hadn't been doing any hero work, not since... not for a long, long time. She could back out. Just change back into her normal street clothes and wait the situation out like any other random citizen would. (Y/N) could live a mundane life, one that she hadn't been given a chance at before.

        But it dawned upon (Y/N) that if she just sat by and watched people die when she could have prevented it, she would be no better than the murderers themselves. (Y/N) wasn't a normal human being, and she knew it. It was up to her to make the right decisions with her powers. And if putting herself in a dangerous, tough, trigger-filled situation was what it took to do the right thing? She would. No doubt about it, (Y/N) would throw herself in front of a machine gun if it meant repaying the universe for the power it had given her. 

***

        There was a crowd gathered around the entrance to the subway station. Most of them were the citizens of Queens, trying to get in and save their friends. There was a sprinkling of police officers who were holding the people back with sawhorses, traffic cones, and a hot-dog stand that seemed to have been confiscated from one of the nearby vendors. (Y/N) didn't understand what was stopping the armed forces from charging the station and saving her a lot of trouble. It didn't seem like anything was holding them back.

        It took (Y/N) a few minutes to figure out what was going on. She hid behind a nearby car, watching as the crowd shifted uneasily. It was a mass of people full of pent-up rage, and (Y/N) knew that it would only take them one wrong move to break.

        She crept forwards, her eyes zeroing in on what seemed to be a point of interest for most of the citizens: a man stood in front of the entrance, something clasped in both hands. His body was shielding one of the objects from (Y/N)'s vision. It was larger, about five feet tall and it seemed to be... moving.

        The pieces clicked into place inside (Y/N)'s brain the second the man shifted around and revealed his cargo. A boy, maybe in sixth or seventh grade, was pressed tight to his chest. His pale face was streaked with tears and his already-crimson hair was matted to his head with blood. The boy was obviously terrified, and (Y/N) saw why.

        There was a silver gun barrel pressed to his temple and the man's finger was squeezing the trigger.

        (Y/N) drew in a sharp breath, her (e/c) eyes widening behind her visor. The crowd's hesitation to attack and their anger, the fact that the police weren't dealing with the hostages in the subway station, the boy... the gun. The only thing holding the people back was the possible death of a child.

        (Y/N) could feel rage coursing through her veins, and with it came the familiar feeling of energy forming in her body. This boy wasn't much younger than she was, maybe three or four years at the most. He was scared and he was alone.

        And (Y/N) wasn't going to let him die.

        Three minutes was all (Y/N) needed to make a plan. Each second ticked by like an hour. One more second lost. One less second on the boy's life.

        (Y/N) wasn't much of a planner. She tended to rush into situations the minute they occurred, bluffing her way out of them or just kicking butt. Queens was different than Chicago, though. The people were different and the law was different. (Y/N) had to move very carefully, especially since she was an unknown hero and could easily be mistaken for a criminal in her dark supersuit and helmet.

        (Y/N) decided on a full-on confrontation. She took a deep breath and came out of her hiding spot, holding her head high and walking towards the disturbance. (Y/N) could feel her fingers shaking with anticipation. She was ready to get into the action and do what she used to.

        The first person to notice (Y/N)'s arrival was a young woman, maybe twenty years old, with a pair of glasses perched on her freckled nose. She gasped and jumped back, grabbing the man beside her and pulling him along. The fear in her eyes was obvious, but (Y/N) couldn't tell what was causing it: herself, the man with the gun, or the situation down in the subway. 

        Just in case, (Y/N) held up one hand in greeting. She didn't speak, seeing as her voice was barely muffled by her helmet and she didn't have her voice modification software installed yet. 

        (Y/N) noticed a spark of recognition in a few of the citizens' eyes. An elderly woman pulled a phone out of her pocket and started to tap her fingers aggressively on the screen, mouthing words silently. (Y/N) winced.

        She didn't know how, but the people of Queens- or some of them, at least- seemed to have learned about Pulse. And that was bad, because the reason (Y/N) had ended up quitting hero work temporarily and leaving Chicago was one that she would prefer to leave behind.        

        The police took note of her arrival. One of them moved to stop her, but his efforts were obviously halfhearted and he stepped aside when (Y/N) reached him.

        The man who was holding the boy captive didn't act scared. Well, nobody except for (Y/N) would have been able to tell. For her, it was as plain as day. His fingers were twitching on the gun, like he was deciding whether or not to just cut out the middleman and shoot the kid or to run. His eyes were wide and kept flicking back and forth between the entrance to the subway and (Y/N).

        "Don't come any closer!" He shouted, his voice gravelly and rough. "Stop moving or I'll shoot him!"

        (Y/N) stopped short when she saw him dig the barrel of the gun into the boy's skull. He winced, another tear leaking out of his eye. Her heart ached for what he was going through.

        (Y/N) raised both hands, palms facing out as she glared at the man through her visor. She wanted to kill him. Something in her brain was pushing for her to blast him right then and there. To end him for what he was doing. And, just like that, (Y/N) knew that something was definitely wrong.

        "I'll give you until the count of three to step away from the boy, drop the weapon, and hand yourself over," (Y/N) said. She hoped her voice wasn't being recorded or identified, but there was nothing she could do about it. She had to save him. 

        "Yeah, right. Like you could actually do anything to-"

        "I didn't finish. You have until the count of three or I'll kill you, and I won't hesitate to do so. Consider your next actions carefully because they may be your last."

        The man's eyes widened. "You couldn't kill me without killing-"

        "One."

        "Now, wait a minute-!"

        "Two."

        "Quit the bluff and-"

        "Three," (Y/N) finished calmly. 

        She extended both of her arms, funneling the power that was welling up inside of her into her arms. Without a second thought, (Y/N) released everything- pain, anger, trauma, frustration, sadness, and everything else that had been generated in the last three or four days- in a series of energy pulses. They glowed (f/c), taking the form of fist-sized orbs as they flew through the air and slammed into the man's chest.

        He flew backwards, dead before he hit the floor. The gun was thrown to one side. The boy, yelping loudly, covered his head with his hands and hit the dirt the minute he was released. (Y/N) had hit her target full on; she never really missed.

        (Y/N) raced over over to the kid's crumpled form. She knelt beside him, placing a hand on one of his shoulders while simultaneously gesturing for the police to stand back. He needed space.

        "Are you alright?" She asked, her voice soft and gently. "You're not hit, are you?"

        The boy didn't reply. He looked up to her with wide eyes. (Y/N) was an intimidating figure in her suit, even though she was rather petite and wasn't very threatening in reality. After a moment of hesitation, she reached up with one gloved hand and pushed her visor up. (Y/N) only revealed her eyes, showing him that she was younger and could be trusted.

        "You've gotta keep my secret, okay, kid?" She said, returning her visor to its original place. "Now answer my question. On a scale of one to ten, how badly are you hurt?"

        "Four or five. He hit me over the head when I tried to fight and that's why I'm bleeding, but he didn't shoot me or anything. But the people down in the subway... some of them are in pretty bad condition."

        "Don't worry about them. Do you know anything about the situation; is there anything you could tell me?"

        "There are lots of people who were on their commute, but there are also a lot of the gangsters. You might not be able to take care of all of them."

        "Don't worry about me. Anything else?"

        "Yeah." The boy trailed off, then continued. "My nanny and little sister are down there. If there's any way you could save them, get them back up here... I don't know what's going to happen to them. If you find them, tell them I'm okay. My name is Eli."        

        "I'll keep an eye out, Eli," (Y/N) promised. She patted him on the shoulder, then stood. "Stay up here. Once the paramedics arrive, I want you on the first ambulance. Got it?"

        "Yeah."

        (Y/N) turned to address the crowd, but Eli grabbed her wrist. "Wait. What's your name? Where did you come from?"        

        (Y/N) was silent for a moment before she spoke. "My name is Pulse. That's all you need to know."  
***  
        It was worse than (Y/N) had expected by a long shot. Not as bad as a few issues she had seen, that was for sure. But it was still pretty horrendous. And for (Y/N) to say that something was bad? Well, that was a problem and a bit of a shock, because she had seen some stuff in her time in Chicago.

        Eli hadn't been exaggerating; there were definitely a lot of people down in the station. (Y/N) had warned the police to stay up in the streets and wait for backup because of the potential loss of life, meaning that she was truly alone. She estimated that there had to be at least one hundred and fifty people, maybe even two hundred.

        They were all gathered into a ball in the center of the underground station, gathered around a few of the support pillars. Women, children, teenagers, men, and the elderly sat on the dirty ground with their mouths closed tightly and terror in their eyes. (Y/N)'s stomach turned when she saw a few babies thrown into the mix, snot and tears of confusion smeared all over their faces.

        The captors were obviously your run-of-the-mill criminals. Most of them wore bandanas over their noses and mouths in a feeble attempt to conceal their identities. A few sported baseball caps, beanies, and tinted sunglasses. Their choice of clothing was extremely heavy- ripped peacoats, scarves, and puffy jackets- even in the brisk fall weather. Most of them were men, but there was a small group of armed women gathered to one side.

        The weapons looked like they had been dragged out of dumpsters and garbage trucks, then washed with dish soap or something of the like. Most of the criminals carried pistols, all of them rusted and worn. Some held knives, broken pipes, and busted glass bottles. It wasn't the most well thought out crime in the history of New York, that was for sure.

        (Y/N) took a couple of minutes to draw everything in, then slipped out of her hiding space- a bend in the staircase that led down into the station. She had identified the person who seemed to be in charge: a brutish man with a crooked nose who had to be almost seven feet tall. He was one of the criminals who carried a gun, which could pose an issue. Then again, as Pulse, (Y/N)'s powers could disable that kind of weapon so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

        (Y/N) tried to make herself look bigger and stronger than she really was. It wasn't exactly a struggle, seeing as she certainly wasn't weak. She was thin and small, and a bit on the short side, but she was also muscular and lithe. (Y/N) could stand her ground against these people. 

        It didn't take long for the criminals to take note of her arrival. She had come right down the front entrance to make sure she was seen, and it worked perfectly.

        The leader's eyes widened when he saw (Y/N) in her suit. He stumbled backwards,hands fumbling the gun and fingers dancing over the trigger. It was easy to see that he hadn't been prepared for an attack.

        "What- who-?!"

        "If you're wondering about your guard," (Y/N) began calmly, "you needn't worry about him. He's dead, and if you don't throw your weapons down and surrender yourselves immediately, you will be too. I'll give you the same warning I did him: you have-"

        "Back the hell up!" The man exclaimed, cutting (Y/N) off.

        Under the mask, she smiled. This low-class murderer was playing right into her hands, just like she had been expecting.

        "You shouldn't interrupt, buddy," (Y/N) said. She allowed her smirk to seep into her voice to make sure he knew she wasn't messing around. "Now, if I can continue, you have until the count of three to place your weapons on the ground, kick them away, and release your hostages or none of you will be leaving this station alive. If you have any doubts as to whether or not I'm messing around, ask the man you placed up there as a guard. Oh, wait. You can't."

        That comment definitely struck a nerve. The man winced visibly, taking one step back. Hatred took over his expression. (Y/N) wondered if he had personally known the guard.

        "Yeah, you heard that. Now I want you to do this nice and easy or you can have a demonstration of exactly what I can do to you."

        "I don't think so," the leader said in a harsh voice. "I recognize you, little kid. You're that Pulse hero from Chicago who disappeared a few months back. We all thought you'd kicked it or something. Maybe even given up after you ended up-"

        (Y/N) extended her arm in his direction and released another pulse of energy in his direction. Her face remained expressionless as it collided with his head and a loud crack resounded through the chamber and he fell to the floor, his neck bent at an odd angle. He was dead.

        A few of the crooks cried out, turning as if they wanted to run before they realized that there was no other way to escape than the one (Y/N) was guarding. The rest of them drew their weapons and advanced in her direction, ugly scowls on their faces. The trapped citizens cowered around the columns, holding onto loved ones in fear.

        (Y/N) grinned, shaking her arms out and rolling her neck. She waited for her opponents to move a bit closer, trying to get them within a striking range that would keep the hostages safe. The minute one of the women rushed forward, a gun held up to eye level, (Y/N) struck.

***

        Peter cursed himself under his breath as he zipped through the city, slinging webs this way and that. He didn't care where they landed, just that they got him where he needed to go. And fast, too. Because he was running out of time.

        He hadn't found out about the hostage situation in downtown Queens until minutes earlier when Ned had rushed into the cafeteria and dragged him into the bathrooms to inform him of the issue. Peter had practically ended up having a panic attack, changing into his suit and sneaking out of the window with his mask in one hand.

        People who had been going about their day only minutes before were all watching as he soared through the sky above, excitedly pointing at him and shouting supportive comments in his general direction. They knew what was going on, and they couldn't wait to find out what was going to happen.

        Peter raised a hand in greeting, giving them a two-fingered salute before continuing his journey to the subway station. He had to move faster; anything could have happened in the amount of time that had passed since Peter had left the school. The hostages could already be injured or dead, and everything could have been over.

***

        Peter raced down into the subway, ignoring the paramedics and first responders who tried to stop him. He was already prepared to shoot straight into action and take the criminals out, then go back to his Aunt's apartment and probably fall asleep. But he certainly wasn't prepared for the sight that greeted him.

        The fight had started without him, and it was already blown into full-swing. A few people were already dead on the floor, though they were obviously the criminals. A few of them had broken necks or burned features, and one of them had been thrown into a wall. Civilians were huddled in the center of the underground room, gripping each other like their lives depended on it- and in this sort of a fight, they probably did. 

        A blur of (f/c) energy whizzed past Peter's head and exploded against the tile walls. A spray of plaster flew through the air, prompting him to duck. A strangled gasp escaped from his mouth.

        The fight was moving so quickly that it was hard for Peter to discern the criminals from the person who seemed to be attacking them. All he could catch was a black suit, shining and skin-tight in the flourescent lights overhead. Sometimes there was a flash of light or a hint of black kevlar that seemed to be set into a helmet.

        Peter snapped out of his daze when the mysterious savior of the hostages took a fist to the neck. Their head snapped back and they stumbled slightly, falling back to lean up against a wall. A man with messy gray hair and a beard held a pistol up, finger on the trigger, pointing it directly at the black-suited stranger.

        He hurtled into the room, one hand stretching out to send a web in the general direction of the scuffle. The white material struck the man with the gun and sent him reeling into a column.

        Peter jumped straight into the clump of fighters, taking people out left and right- although it wasn't very graceful. He poked one woman in the eye with a gloved finger, eliciting a screech of pain. One of his feet connected with someone's jaw, and he knocked heads with a young man, efficiently knocking him out.

        The other hero- or that's who Peter assumed they were, seeing as they had been trying to rescue the hostages- hopped up from their position against the wall and held out both hands, firing a blast of light into the center of the fight and sending a few people flying. Peter, fortunately, was not one of them.

        With the combined strength of two heroes, it didn't take long to finish off what was left of the criminals. After four or five minutes, they were all on the ground in varying states of disrepair.

        Peter turned back to the person in black, who was already making their way across the room to check on the terrified civilians. He took in their appearance as well as he could: the tight black suit, the motorcycle helmet, the gloves, and the femenine curves. So that's a female hero.

        Peter helped the woman get the people out of the station and into the light. It didn't take very long, because they were practically stampeding each other to get away. He spoke to the paramedics about what he had seen, trying to get finished so he could speak to the new hero. But when Peter was finally finished, she was gone. He searched for her for what felt like hours, but she never appeared. It was like she had vanished into thin air.


	5. Party?

   (Y/N) probed the tender skin of her neck, wincing as a dull ache spread through her body. She had taken a pretty hard hit, and the criminal must have been wearing rings, because there were two little scrape marks on her windpipe where she had been struck. It hurt like hell, but there wasn't much she could do about it.

        (Y/N) couldn't get that image out of her head: the red and blue suit, the white eye holes in a mask, and the blur of color that had whizzed past her when she was about to be shot. Spiderman.

        He seemed younger than he had looked in the newspaper. His picture had been pretty intimidating, but maybe that was just the angle it had been taken from. In reality, he was only three or four inches taller than (Y/N). Yeah, that was a lot, but from his descriptions and the way that the reporters praised him, she had been expecting some monster of a guy in his thirties. Spiderman couldn't have been out of high school yet, judging from his build. 

        (Y/N) shook her head as she scanned her appearance in the bathroom mirror. She had changed out of her Pulse suit into a pair of sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt. The suit was great to wear during the day, but she couldn't sleep in it. The fabric wasn't that comfortable, which was really annoying. It was a kink that she had never found time to work out.

        Dinner was simple, as usual. (Y/N) had done all of her shopping the night before, so she didn't have to leave her apartment. She ended up grabbing a few pieces of bread and a banana before crashing on the couch with her laptop.

        The first thing that popped up on her newsbar, to no surprise of her own, was a report on the subway attack. (Y/N)'s heart sank as she clicked on the icon, unable to keep her attention off of the problem at hand. This wasn't the first time it had happened, and it wouldn't be the last. Dreading what she was about to see, (Y/N) opened up the article.

        Across the top of the screen, in bold, italicized letters, read New super duo to take on the street crimes of Queens, New York? Below the headlines was a full-color picture of Pulse and Spiderman in the subway station. Pulse was firing an energy blast straight into the face of one of the criminals while Spiderman soared overhead on a line of web. (Y/N) had no idea how the picture had been taken, but the damage was already done.

        The page had been written by the same woman who had been the author of the Spiderman article: Lea Martinez, the editor in chief. It was obvious from the first glance that she had done some digging around in (Y/N)'s past. The young hero gritted her teeth, balling up her gloved fists and reaching up to fiddle with a strand of (h/c) hair that was still wet from her shower. It took her a few minutes to contain her temper, and once she had, she continued reading the article.

        Although many residents of the Queens area have gotten used to the sight of a certain red-suited superhero zooming through the skies overhead on a string of spider silk, none of us were expecting the drastic turn of events that occurred earlier today. A new hero- well, that's to be debated- has appeared on the streets, and she's taking the media by storm.

        Around four o'clock this afternoon, reports about a hostage situation reached our newsrooms. It was truly an awful sight to behold: two hundred people on their daily commute were trapped in a subway station with no way out and nobody to save them. The culprits? Fifty armed thugs, carrying an assortment of different weapons. The situation may have seemed hopeless, with no sightings of Spiderman nearby.

        Just when things started to get worse, after two men had been shot and a young boy was taken and held at gunpoint, a miracle appeared in the form of a black-suited hero known as Pulse by the people of Chicago, her former stomping grounds. She managed to save the child and dispatch most of the criminals without injuring a single civilian. Spiderman, uncharacteristically late, showed up once she was almost completed and assisted her in finishing them off.

        Eli Evans, 12, was held at gunpoint in the entrance of the station for nearly thirty minutes before Pulse appeared to save him. His sister Marie, 8, and his nanny Morra, 23, were being kept in the station. We were able to ask him a few questions before he was taken to the hospital to be checked for any injuries.

        When asked the question: "What did you feel were Pulse's intentions towards you?" by a reporter, Eli seemed shocked that we would even consider her to be a villian.

        "She was there to save me. She didn't do anything bad and she wasn't trying to scare me, either. All she wanted to do was help. Like Spiderman."

        It was immediately obvious that, while Eli is a witness to the crime, he cannot be considered reliable. Many citizens of the United States under the age of fourteen and fifteen cannot be credited with knowledge of Pulse, as they see her as yet another superhero. However, if Eli had learned about the events leading up to Pulse's transfer from Chicago to Queens, it is believed that he would have an extremely different outlook on the situation.

        But for our readers to understand the newest "hero" of Queens, we at the Gazette have to do some explaining.

        Pulse has been dormant for a few months now, but she was active for over two years before her sudden hiatus in hero work. We all remember why she disappeared: the attack on Willis Tower on August 18th of this year, almost three months ago to the day.

        It had started like a normal day: Tourists were flocking to the skyscraper, as they always do. It was one of the busiest days of the year according to our sources, making what happened next much more tragic than it could have been.

        Around noon, a pair of men carrying disguised weapons managed to bypass security. Nobody knows how, but we have been assured that investigations are being carried out. These men, armed with technology advanced enough to bring down a building, rode the elevator up to the top story- where the bulk of people were gathered.

        Once they arrived, they opened fire on the crowd. Twenty people were killed instantly and more continued to fall by the minute as the infrastructure of the building was threatened and compromised.

        And there she was, in her trademark motorcycle helmet with her hands already heating up, ready for battle. Pulse stepped out of the elevator and quickly dispatched the two men.

        But something happened in the span of thirty seconds. Shouts of gratitude turned to horrified screams and pleas for mercy as the renowned hero, the trusted savior of Chicago, turned her powers on the crowd.

        By the end of all the chaos, before the paramedics arrived to assess the damage, Pulse had disappeared and the top five stories of the monumential building had collapsed. Three hundred and eighty seven people were killed that day, with over seven hundred injuries. Over half of said injuries were severe and later caused these people to pass away. The final death toll? Five hundred even. Two hundred of these were children under the age of ten.

        The motive behind Pulse's sudden deviation from her bright path is unknown as of the moment, as is the question we are all asking ourselves: Is Pulse's sudden reappearance benificial to our society, or will we be dealing with another supervillian within the week?Updates will be given as we recieve more news on the subject of interest.

        Written by Lea Martinez, Editor in Chief of the Queens Gazette

        (Y/N) continued scrolling down the page, biting her lip and tilting her head to one side. It wasn't untrue, what the newspapers said. She had used her powers on a group of unarmed civilians, resulting in many of their deaths. But the newspapers had one thing wrong- actually, it wasn't wrong. They were simply misinformed.

        (Y/N) remembered that day like it had only been hours. The blood, the screaming, the fear in her victims' eyes as they realized that the person who they had been depending on for so long was the one who was going to end their lives. It was impossible to forget; she saw them all the time. In her dreams, when she closed her eyes, every waking and sleeping moment of her life. It was all spent on flooding (Y/N)'s insides with guilt.

        But in all truth, it hadn't been (Y/N)'s fault. When she saw those two men fall, the last moment of the day where she had gained full control over herself, something clicked inside of her. The powers that she depended on so fully were no longer truly her own and there was nothing she could do to stop them. And so (Y/N) had watched, helpless, eyes wide and watery behind her helmet, as she raised an arm into the air...

        After the ordeal had been over and (Y/N) was finally able to stop, she had taken off. Maybe it was the horror of what she had done or the sirens wailing in the distance. Maybe it was the fear in the survivors' eyes. Whatever it was, it scared her. And it took a lot to scare (Y/N) (Y/L/N).

        She had cried that night. For hours and hours, sprawled out on the tile floor of her bathroom. That was another thing they would never know. How much (Y/N) cared about the lives she had taken.

***

        The next report came in the form of a video from a newsroom instead of a written article. Curious, (Y/N) moved her mouse over the play button and clicked it. She had already been reminded of the traumatic experience at Willis Tower and figured it couldn't get much worse. Besides, she wanted to keep her guard up about the city and its intentions towards her.

        The first five or six minutes of the newsreel were all focused on her past, which was sort of useless. I mean, she had sort of been there. (Y/N) fast-forwarded until she caught sight of a new figure entering the room: a police officer.

        Her interest piqued, (Y/N) leaned in to get a better look at the screen.

        "Will the police be working towards tracking down this rogue hero?" One of the new anchors asked, brushing her short hair out of her eyes. "Or will Pulse be allowed to roam the streets in a fashion similar to our native heroes?"

        "I can't make any comments for sure on that subject," the police officer replied calmly. "The chief of police has actually been considering this question for a while. I can promise, however, that if Pulse chooses to injure any of our citizens... well, there'll be hell to pay."

        "Is she being held responsible for the lives lost on Willis Tower?"

        "This is another subject of debate for the city officials. Justice will be served where it is due."

        (Y/N) smirked, raising an eyebrow. It was amusing to watch the officials scramble over the sudden turn of events, trying to make it look like they were important. (Y/N), although she was still young and was barely in high school, saw through their ruse. They were children squabbling over a tiny patch of existence, trying to seem bigger than they actually were.

        Oh, justice would be served. (Y/N) would make sure of it.  
***  
Peter turned around to glance at Ned, his face illuminated in the glow of his computer. That was the only source of light in his room, but it was more than enough. Peter found himself squinting at the bright rays. He had no idea how his self-proclaimed 'man in the chair' wasn't going blind.

        It had been a crazy few days since Ned had seen Peter in his Spiderman suit. Well, that's actually an understatement. It had been totally insane.

        Everything had been okay for the first day or so. Peter had dealt with a robbery at the bank across from his favorite store, Delmar's, and it hadn't turned out so well. The thieves had gained access to some sort of high-tech weapons that sprayed purple light all over the place and had destroyed both the bank and the little deli across the way. They hadn't gotten away, fortunately, but Peter had a bad feeling about them. This wasn't over.

        And then there was the incident with Pulse earlier that day. Yeah, that had been interesting. It had taken a couple of hours for Peter to process exactly what had happened in the subway station with the new vigilante. It had been... well, to put it simply, amazing. Pulse's powers rivaled his own, and that could end up being either a blessing or a curse.

        So there they were. Peter had invited Ned back to his Aunt May's apartment under the pretenses of working on Ned's Lego Death Star. They were actually planning on doing some digging around to find out more about the newest unnatural presence in their city. May didn't suspect anything. In her words, "No suspicious noises, no explosions, no car horns or smoke, and I'll leave you alone".

        Two hours had passed since they had buckled down to work and nothing good had come out of it. Sure, Ned had stumbled upon a couple of recent articles and a newsfeed about the incident earlier that day. But Peter had actually been a part of the action, so he didn't exactly need a recap.

        He had also discovered an older article, dated almost three months prior, about an attack at Willis Tower in Chicago. Peter had learned about it from Tony Stark but hadn't got any of the details. He hadn't known that Pulse was the culprit or about what had really happened, just that there was a problem and the Avengers needed to fix it. Tony, Cap, Barton, and Natasha had left only hours later and that was the last Peter had heard about it. Case closed, problem solved, ordeal over.

        But apparently that wasn't true. Because the individual behind those murders, that massacre, had appeared out of nowhere. She had been standing right in front of Peter, fighting beside him. And... Peter had saved her life.

        Crap.

        "Hey, check this out!" Ned exclaimed. He pulled the Spiderman mask off of his head-  which was a bit stretched, but Peter knew it would be fine after a while- and tossed it to its rightful owner.

        Peter caught the piece of fabric and allowed his grip on the ceiling to release. He had been hanging upside down for at least half an hour, waiting for sudden inspiration to strike. Obviously, it hadn't.

        He nimbly caught the top of his bunk bed with one hand and lowered himself to the ground, twisting around to sit beside Ned. The other boy's eyes were wide; he wasn't used to seeing Peter do all of his Spiderman-y stuff without a second thought.

        "Whatcha got?" Peter asked, forcing the words through a yawn. It was after eleven at night and he was exhausted. "Please tell me it's something good so you can go home and I can go to sleep."

        "I think it is," Ned said. "I dug through a few dozen pages of newsreels and fan videos of you and the avengers and I think I might've found something about her. Before Willis Tower, I mean. When her reputation was clean." He gestured towards a link at the top of the page.

        "Well?" Peter muttered impatiently. "Just click the stupid thing already."

        Ned did as he was told and pushed the volume button a few times, trying to get it to a point where they could actually hear what was going on. The video was similar to that of the ones fans and bystanders made about other heroes; by that I mean it was grainy and the quality was pretty bad. But it was clear enough that Peter could easily see what was going on.

        Pulse, clad in the same suit she had been wearing earlier that day, was scrapping it out with a pair of armed thugs. Peter found his eyes glued to the screen, wide and shining as he studied her technique. It was practically flawless; every kick was perfectly executed and each bolt of energy hit its target.

        "That's awesome," Ned said in his 'fanboy-slash-nerd' voice. "Peter, are you seeing this? She's like you!"

        Peter nodded, but he didn't take his eyes off of the screen. "Hey, Ned?"

        "Yeah?"

        "How old do you think she is? Not in the video. Like, right now."

        "I dunno. Somewhere in her twenties, maybe? Early thirties?"

        "I don't think so," Peter replied. He reached out and paused the video, scrutinizing Pulse's stance. "She's too small to be in her twenties. Too curvy and petite."

        "So what, you think you just got showed up by a tween or something?"

        "She didn't show me up. But c'mon, Ned. Look at her. You honestly think Pulse is older than nineteen or twenty? Because I think that's probably around where she is."

        "I doubt it. That would've made her, like, seventeen when she first got started. Not possible."

        "Is so."

        "Is not."

        "Is so."

        "Is not."

        This went on for at least five more minutes. Ned and Peter argued pointlessly, poking each other like small children who were fighting over a toy. Peter was the one to finally rein it in.

        He leaned back, sighing and allowing his head to bump up against the wall.

        "I think that's enough for today, Ned. You need a ride home? Do you want me to walk you?"

        "Nah, I'm fine. Here's your computer."

        Peter took it and placed it on his desk, standing up to walk Ned out of the apartment. Just before he closed the door, Ned turned around to look up at him.

        "Tell me about any updates on the situation tomorrow at school, okay?"

        "Yeah, Ned. Of course."

***

        (Y/N) fiddled with the fingers on her gloves, her eyes fixed to the whiteboard. Every few minutes, they would wander over to rest on Peter, who was sitting next to her. He would look up, sensing the weight of (Y/N)'s gaze on him, and she would look away. Then the cycle would start over again. It was monotonous, but they both found themselves enjoying it.

        Peter had been acting pretty weird all day. They didn't share their first two classes, which was pretty annoying, but it worked fine. Michelle was back and although she wasn't a great partner for conversation, (Y/N) was happy to see her. Having classes on her own was hard, especially since she was new.

        Peter had practically fallen asleep at his desk before science had started. (Y/N) had ended up having to smack him gently to get him to wake up, because he was totally unresponsive. It was odd because- even though (Y/N) had only known him for about twenty-four hours- Peter didn't seem like one to slack.

        (Y/N) found out why they had been so out of it at lunch, when they sat down with their trays. Michelle ended up hanging out with them, even if it was just to read her book.

        "Did you see the news last night?" Ned asked (Y/N).

        "Er... yes? About what?" (Y/N) skirted around the topic at hand, not wanting to hear what they had to say about her alter ego. She had been expecting it, though; they were high school students and it was sort of what they did.

        "That freaky subway attack! The one with Pulse and Spiderman, you know? Wasn't that so cool?!"

        "Yeah, I guess. Pretty cool."

        "What do you think about Pulse?" Peter asked casually, picking at his cuticles as he stared at someone across the cafeteria. "Any opinions on her?"

        "Not really. I guess it's nice that she's trying to turn everything around? I dunno."

        "I think she's fine," Michelle muttered. The dark-haired girl didn't look up from her book. "It's a conundrum."

        "What do you mean?" Ned asked.

        "I mean that she made a mistake and did something good. Nobody knows what to think of her. How do we know she's a girl, anyways?"

        "Well, she has-"

        "Ned." Peter cut his friend off, swiveling around to glare at him. "How about no. Let's not."

        (Y/N) found herself blushing, sinking down into her chair to try and hide her flushed cheeks. It was hard to hear people talking about her when they didn't know who she was, even though they had no idea about what they were saying. Ned didn't mean anything, but it was still sort of embarrassing. 

        "Could just be a very femenine man," Michelle replied stubbornly. "Don't assume genders, Ned."

***

        (Y/N) watched out of the corner of her eye as Peter did sit ups, slightly surprised. He was moving so fast; almost as fast as she was. Skinny, pale, nerdy Peter Parker was the last person (Y/N) thought would be excelling at gym.

        It looked like he was sort of lost in himself. Ned was holding his feet down with both of his knees, practically sitting on the smaller boy as they worked. 

        The entire gym class was doing the 'Captain America' challenge, the name of which made (Y/N) want to injure somebody and the execution of which made (Y/N) want to commit a murder. It wasn't that she was bad at it; she was actually quite good because of her nightly escapades. It was just... obnoxious, to put it lightly. Not that (Y/N) wasn't enjoying it, because she did.

        Michelle was multitasking. She was sitting on (Y/N)'s feet and leaning up against her knees like they were a backrest, reading and glancing backwards every few minutes to check and make sure (Y/N) wasn't cheating. Every time Michelle saw that she wasn't, she seemed slightly surprised (but not that much, because she was incredibly observant and had already figured out that (Y/N) was slightly different from the rest of their class).

        "How are you doing that?" Ned called over, his eyes wide as he stared at (Y/N).

        (Y/N) blushed, realizing that she had been speeding up until her back barely touched the floor before she was back up. She wasn't even breathing heavily. 

        Peter glanced over to look at the female duo, raising his eyebrows and sending an amused thumbs up in (Y/N)'s direction. She smiled gently and tried to slow down a bit, but it felt weird. She eventually shrugged and decided to continue at her own pace, which was really fast.

        "PETER KNOWS SPIDERMAN!"

        (Y/N) stopped in the middle of a sit up, turning to stare at Peter like he was nuts. All of the activity in the room stopped as everyone looked at Peter and Ned.

        Peter glared at Ned like he wanted to murder him.

        "No, I don't. Shut up, Ned."

        (Y/N) watched as Flash Thompson approached the two boys, biting her lip. She knew that something bad was about to happen and gestured for Michelle to move. She complied, but she looked like she hadn't wanted to.

        "I wouldn't get involved if I were you," Michelle warned. "Those two losers can handle themselves."

        "Yeah. I'm just gonna..."

        (Y/N) turned around and hopped over the mats, brushing her gloves off as she made her way over to the disturbance. Peter was gaping and fuming, ready to kill Ned.

        "Peter, let's just go. Okay? Let's go," (Y/N) said. She took his hand in hers, warm fingers entwining. Peter jumped as a jolt of what felt like electricity ran through his body. It wasn't unpleasant, but it was a weird feeling.

        "Got yourself a girlfriend?" Flash asked, his tone taunting and childish. "A nerdy little girlfriend just like you?"

        "You're one to talk," (Y/N) said calmly. She pulled her hair out of its ponytail, letting it fall around her shoulders. "Peter's more than you'll ever be and you know it."

        Flash seemed slightly taken aback at the harshness in (Y/N)'s voice. He opened his mouth to speak again, but Liz cut him off.

        "If you know Spiderman, he could come to my party. You're all welcome to come if you want," she said sweetly. "I'd love to see you there."

        "I... I... I don't know," Peter muttered.

        "It's fine, I get it."

        (Y/N) was crushed by the hopeless expression on Peter's face. "He'll be there."

        "I will?" Peter asked, his eyes wide.

        "Of course. If that's okay with the host?" (Y/N) looked to Liz.

        "Absolutely!" Liz exclaimed. "I'll see you guys there!"


	6. Maybe Not

        (Y/N) turned to glare at Peter and Ned the minute they had exited the gym. She pulled the two boys aside, each fist wrapped around one of their collars, and stopped once she reached an abandoned hallway. The plating of her glove chafed against Peter's chest, making him wince. He had to admit that it was an odd fashion statement, even for the teenagers of his day and age. Not that the gloves didn't suit (Y/N), because they certainly did. Oddly enough, they looked... slightly familiar. Like he had seen them somewhere other than on (Y/N)'s hands.

        Peter didn't have much time to figure out where he had seen them, though, because (Y/N) let go of their respective shirts and stepped backwards. She was surprisingly strong for such a small person. And surprisingly scary, too. Her (e/c) eyes were cold and her lips were pursed into a straight line. (Y/N)'s hair had frizzed up in the front, (h/c) ringlets cascading down to frame her face. It was sort of hot attractive; Peter couldn't ignore it. But it was also terrifying.

        "What the hell was that, Ned?" (Y/N) asked, her voice an angry whisper. "Are you trying to get Peter killed by that ape?"

        "I dunno," Ned replied. He had the decency to appear ashamed. "It just popped out. Sorry, (Y/N)."

        (Y/N) shook her head. She reached up and facepalmed, dragging her hand down until her fingers rested on the bridge of her nose like she was trying to quell a headache. "I've only been here a day and a half and I know that you guys are nuts. Should I be associating myself with you, or is that going to get me beat up?"

        Peter blushed. "You probably shouldn't..."

        "Too bad, because I guess I'm stuck with you now. Do you actually know Spiderman, Peter, or was that just a bluff?"

        "The one from Youtube?" Peter asked, trying to make it look like he wasn't too obvious. "Yeah, I've seen him around. Talked to him a few times. But I wouldn't call him my-"

        "They're really close," Ned cut in.

        Peter glared at Ned. He was holding back the urge to slap his friend, but it was a losing battle. Peter settled for a fist to the bicep. "Dude, no we aren't! Just shut up, okay? You're making this worse."

        "No, I'm-"

        "You know what, Ned? I think you need to go ahead to our next class. Alright? (Y/N) and I will meet you there a little bit later."

        "But I don't-"

        "Yeah, I know. You don't want to be late, and neither do we. So just go on," Peter said calmly. It was plain to see that he was holding back a lot of annoyance for fear of hurting his friend's feelings.

        Ned pouted like a child, but in the end he decided to comply. He turned and left, walking down the hallway and out of sight.

        (Y/N) and Peter waited until Ned was gone to turn back to each other. She raised her eyebrow, tilting her head to one side like she was waiting for an explanation. Peter didn't really know what to tell her. He didn't want to lie, but he definitely wasn't about to tell her the truth. What would he have said? Oh, by the way, I'm Spiderman. Yeah, the web slinging parkour guy from Youtube. You wanna go ahead to class? No, that would just freak (Y/N) out.

        "You know what, I'm just going to forget everything Ned said about you and Spiderman and everything."

        Peter stared at (Y/N) in surprise. "Thanks. And I swear he was just bluffing."

        "I don't believe that for one second, Peter. Stop digging yourself into a hole, okay? Let's just walk to class and talk. I don't want to be late."

        "Yeah... yeah, okay."

        (Y/N) and Peter walked side-by-side through the hallways, each of which was practically empty. They were silent for a little while, the only sound that of their shoes against the floor. Peter was the first to speak.

        "Are you going to go to Liz's party later?"

        "I dunno," (Y/N) sighed. "I don't know her that well and I wouldn't want to intrude."

        "I'm sure it would be fine. I could ask her if you wanted me to. Besides, she said you could come. I don't see why that would change."

        (Y/N) smiled. "This might surprise you, but I'm not that great in social settings. And I don't really like people."

        "That hurts, (Y/N). I really thought we had something."

        She laughed airily, shaking her head. "Not what I meant, Peter. You're okay because I don't get the feeling that you really like social settings, either. Same with Michelle. And Ned? Ned's like a kid. Someone's gotta protect him."

        "Exactly how I feel. Hey, (Y/N), would you change your mind about the party if someone asked you to go with them?"

        "I guess. It depends on the person, too. If it was Flash, I'd just punch him in the mouth. Like, as a friend or as a date?"

        "Whichever you would want it to be. Do you think you'd say yes?"

        "Again, it depends on who it is. But I don't really have anything to do for a while and I guess it would be pretty fun to do something."

        "Awesome! Can I pick you up?"

        (Y/N) turned to stare at Peter, confused. "Huh?"

        "Oh." Peter blushed. "I think I forgot the important part."

        "I think you might have."

        "My mistake. Can I take you to Liz's party tonight?"

        (Y/N)'s cheeks flushed so they were roughly the same color as Peter's. "Sure. I'd like that."

        "Do you want me to pick you up or should we meet somewhere? My Aunt would have to drive us because I'm still too young."

        "You could pick me up if you want to. You don't know my address, do you?"        

        "No, that would be weird. Do you want to write it down? Also, do you have a phone? Because I might need your number. I get lost pretty easily."

        Stupid, Peter thought, internally cursing himself. Did you really just ask her for her number? You look so desperate.

        But (Y/N) only nodded, pulling out a piece of paper and a pen. She scribbled a few words out and handed the scrap to Peter, tapping her finger below below a set of digits.

        "(xxx)-xxx-xxx. That's it. I live on Palm Boulevard."

        "That's actually not too far away from my Aunt's place. Will your uncle be okay with you if you go out?"

        "Yeah. He's been pretty busy lately. I haven't seen him for a few days, actually. He gets back pretty late. I'll just leave him a note or something like that."

        "Sounds good. What time is okay with you?"

        "Er... between six and seven, maybe? Did Liz say what time it was going to start? I don't really have experience with this kind of thing."

        "It's probably going to be later. Like, eight or something. But I can pick you up as early as you want me to. We could just hang out if you wanted to. Before the party, I mean. If you want."

        "Yeah. That sounds nice."

        "I'll walk over to your house and we can hang out, then May and Ned can come pick us up. That okay?"

        "Yeah. One question; who's May?"

        "Oh, sorry. She's my aunt. Six or seven, then?"

        "Six or seven."

        After a second thought, (Y/N) pushed herself up onto her tiptoes and planted a light kiss on Peter's cheek.

        "Thanks, Peter."

        Then, she turned and walked away, leaving a stunned Peter behind.

***

        Idiot. I'm such an idiot. Look at his face, he hated that. And now I've probably lost him. (Y/N) glared at her reflection in the mirror, her (e/c) eyes practically drowning in embarassment and regret.

        She had kissed him, and she was regretting it. Peter had only known her for two days and she was already enroaching on his personal space. (Y/N) wanted to tell herself it had only been a friendly kiss, but that would've been stupid. Because she knew it hadn't been.

        There was a big chance that Peter wouldn't even come to pick (Y/N) up at all. He would probably go to hang out with Ned or hit on Liz or something along those lines. Yeah, that sounded about right. (Y/N) didn't need to even get ready to go.

        But she couldn't help herself. It wasn't often that (Y/N) got a chance to dress nice- or nicer than usual, because it wasn't a fancy sort of thing- and go out with a friend, mainly because she didn't have many friends. But Peter had seemed different. That is, unless she had ruined everything with him.

        (Y/N) searched through the sparse contents of her dresser for a few minutes before deciding on a pair of simple black jeans that bunched up slightly around her ankles, just the way she liked it. As usual, (Y/N) wore her suit under her street clothes, so she had to cover up completely. She just hoped nobody noticed or cared about her gloves- or worse, tried to take them off. 

        (Y/N) picked out her favorite flannel shirt and pulled it on over the smooth fabric of her Pulse uniform. It was a mix of black, white, and (f/c) patterns and the cuffs fit comfortably around her wrists to hide the tight black sleeves of the suit. To finish the look off, (Y/N) slipped a pair of simple leather combat boots onto her feet and pulled her (h/c) hair up into a ponytail. On second thought she took it down and discarded the hair tie, allowing it to fall in waves around her face as a sort of frame.

        (Y/N) turned back to scrutinize her appearance yet again. She had to admit that she did look nice, after using a bit of makeup to cause her eyes to pop out and brushing a tiny bit of blush onto her cheeks. Her lips were adorned with a light coating of shimmery gloss. She wasn't conventionally pretty- at least, that's what she thought- but she looked acceptable. And even if Peter didn't come, (Y/N) could rest easy knowing she looked good. Not that it really mattered for the teenage superhero.

***

        Needless to say, (Y/N) had absolutely no cause to worry. Peter had never really been kissed by anyone other than his Aunt May, and that was just on the forehead. It wasn't like he hadn't fantazised about it, because he had. But in his fantasies, Peter was normally being kissed by Liz or some other older girl. He had never expected his first not-related kiss to be from (Y/N). He didn't really mind, though. Even if he had just met her, and it wasn't technically a first kiss because it hadn't been on the lips, and he didn't know if it had been something she did with all of her friends... well, Peter couldn't help falling in love a little bit.

        So there he was, curly brown hair combed back a bit neater than usual, face pale, standing at (Y/N)'s front door. He had texted her earlier to affirm, but she hadn't replied and that had worried him. And he definitely wasn't about to cancel on her.

        Ned and May were waiting in the car. The former had given Peter plenty of accolades on picking up a cute girl, while the latter had- conversely- given him plenty of warnings about what could happen when he picked up a cute girl. Peter had heard it all before and he didn't really care. He could tell (Y/N) wasn't the type to mess with him.

        Peter reached up hesitantly and knocked on the door a few times, then stepped back a bit and waited. It was silent inside for a moment, until a loud crash made him jump.

        "(Y/N)? (Y/N), are you okay?" He called, frantically trying the handle. It was locked. "(Y/N)!"

        "I'm fine! Don't worry, I'm okay. I just dropped something," (Y/N) shouted in reply. "I'll be right there, Peter!"

        There was another loud crash, then the sound of something breaking, then a period of silence before the door opened to reveal (Y/N).

        She was dressed up a bit more than usual, with a nice top and a pair of black jeans that fit her form nicely. The way her hair fell around her face looked really pretty, with waves of color being revealed in the light.

        "Hi," Peter stammered, his eyes wide. "You l-look really nice."

        "Thanks, Peter. You look nice, too. And I'm glad you came." (Y/N)'s voice was quiet and slightly restrained, but it was obvious that she was happy to see him.

        "Of course I did. What was that sound?" Peter asked. He tried to see past (Y/N) into the apartment to figure out what had broken, but she stepped out and closed the door before he could.

        "Oh, that," she laughed. "I'm sort of clumsy. I tripped over a bookshelf. The crash was my lamp, which fell when I tried to stand up. And the breaking sound was a bowl that I accidentaly left out on the counter. But I'm fine."

        "Well, that's reassuring. Sounded like World War Three in here," Peter joked. "Now, may I escort you to the car?"

        (Y/N) giggled as Peter offered her his arm, wiggling his eyebrows like a crazy person.

        "You may."  
***  
        (Y/N) sat between Ned and one of the windows, fiddling with the velcro clasps on one of her gloves. She had been relatively quiet for the majority of the drive, not because she was nervous... oh, wait. That's exactly why. 

        Because of her past and the way she spent her time, (Y/N) had never really been to a party. Most of her evenings since she had turned twelve had been spent fighting crime. This hadn't caused her to become the most well-rounded teenager, but whatever.

        Peter had been watching her out of the corner of his eye the entire time, carefully keeping tabs on her actions. He didn't want to make her uncomfortable- or more uncomfortable than she already looked, because she seemed pretty freaked out. He had no idea why. Sure, he was a bit worried, but that was the kind of worry that came with excitement. (Y/N) just looked downright terrified.

        Aunt May, or May as (Y/N) had been told to address her, had picked up on the tense rays radiating from (Y/N)'s form. She was doing her best to break the silence.

        "First time at a high school party?" May asked, glancing at (Y/N) in the mirror.

        "Um... yes, ma'am."

        "None of that. Call me May," sh insisted. "You don't need to worry about anything. Liz, from what I've heard, is a nice girl. If you're going to her house everything will be fine. Besides, if you guys get bored, Peter's got my number. He can just call in and have me pick you up. Nice hat by the way, Ned."

        Ned smiled, nodding in a quirky little 'Ned' fashion. He tipped his hat in May's direction, making both Peter and (Y/N) wince.

        The hat in question was a fedora, and that wouldn't have been either of the teenagers' first choice for a party. It had a thick black ribbon around the base and was an ugly tan color. It was definitely going to get him harrassed at some point in the near future, but Ned said it gave him confidence, so nobody said anything.

        "So, (Y/N), you came from Chicago?"

        "Yes ma'- yes. I just moved here a few days ago, actually."

        "And you've already been invited to a party? Geez, you must be popular."

        "Not really. I was just hanging out with Ned and Peter, and Liz said we could come if we wanted."

        (Y/N) decided to leave out the part about Peter knowing Spiderman because that was sure as hell going to end up with some sort of a lecture.

        "You're still invited though, aren't you? That's gotta count towards something, right?"

        "I guess."

        There was another moment of awkward silence. May, again, was the first to speak.

        "And Peter told me you lived with your uncle. Do you like it? What's he like? Is it different from what you're used to, or pretty similar?"

        Peter noticed that (Y/N) visibly flinched at May's question. He frowned, craning his neck slightly to see her expression. For some reason, a bolt of worry was sent through his system at the thought of (Y/N) hurting, physically or emotionally. It was weird, because he had known her for about two days. Idiot. You freaking asked her to a party, of course you're worried.

        She recovered face quickly, though, and her expression returned to its serene place.

        "I do like it, yeah. He's pretty nice, but he works a lot on the weeks and gets home pretty late so I don't see him much. He's home on the weekends, though. Living with him is actually pretty different from what I used to know."

        "How so?" Ned asked as he adjusted the brim of his fedora. 

        "Well, I was alone on the weekends at my old house. My parents... they travel a lot, and I haven't seen them in a while. They're still my legal guardians and they paid for my education in Chicago, plus housing and food and my other stuff. I bought a lot of books..." (Y/N) seemed to drift off for a moment before pulling herself back to earth. "But I'm at Midtown on a scholarship because of my preformance at my old school, so they don't have to worry about that."

        "That's kind of cool. What's your uncle's name?"

        "Erm... Max (Y/L/N). He's my dad's brother. Younger. You probably don't know him."

        "No, I don't," May remarked. "I would love to meet him some time, though."

        And there it was again. That little blanch in (Y/N)'s expression, gone as soon as it appeared. May and Ned didn't notice it, but with Peter's heightened senses, it would have been hard to miss. (Y/N) was hiding something, and he wanted to know what.

***

        May pulled Peter aside, keeping him securely in her car until (Y/N) and Ned had exited. She told them she only needed to make sure he knew what to do in certain situations- each example more outrageous than the last- so they could just wait outside for a few seconds. Peter could tell something was off, though. And it didn't take long for her to tell him exactly what it was.

        "She's sweet, isn't she?" May asked, leaning over a bit to meet Peter's eyes. "Attractive. What do you think?"

        Peter knew his face was probably the exact shade of a raspberry. He furrowed his brow, staring at May wordlessly.

        "Well? You're taking a girl to a party, Peter. It's my job to worry. Answer my question."

        "Yeah, I guess. She's pretty cute. But it's not really a da-"

        "Don't mess her up."

        "Excuse me?!" Peter asked indignantly, the embarassed blush giving way to an angry color. "Mess her up?"

        "You know what I mean, Pete. She's a cute little freshman and this is her first real party. You'd better protect her from Flash and his idiots."

        "May, (Y/N) isn't exactly innocent. She showed him up earlier in gym and kind of destroyed him. Plus, she's really strong and doesn't seem to care about what other people think. I'm the last one you should worry about."

        "Pete, don't try to-"

        "Peter, are you coming?" Ned called from the sidewalk, his fedora perched precariously on top of his head.

        "I've gotta go, May."

        "Fine. Just don't-"

        "Mess her up, I know. See you later, okay?"

        "Love you!"

        "Love you, too," Peter said. He leaned over the armrests to kiss his aunt on the cheek before opening the car door and jumping out to meet Ned and (Y/N).

***

        The house was nice. And by that, (Y/N) meant it was really nice. Liz's place was ginourmous and uber-modern, the entire building made up of geometric designs. (Y/N) stared up at it for a minute, her eyes wide and shining in the light that emanated from inside.

        She felt someone take her hand and looked over, meeting Peter's dark eyes. He smiled, squeezing her hand reassuringly and gesturing towards the house.

        "You ready?"

        "I think so," (Y/N) muttered. She bit her lip, not noticing when Peter's eyes flicked from hers down to them and back up again. "I just..."

        "Hey. You're going to be fine, (Y/N). Just stick with me. If they start being stupid or you want to leave, we can leave and do something else. Okay?"        

        "Okay."

        (Y/N) reached up to touch the spot where her helmet was concealed in her ever-present suit, taking a deep breath before following Peter into the house. They closed the door behind themselves, sealing the flashing lights and noise in.

        (Y/N) noticed three important things when she walked into the entry hall. The first was that Flash, dark hair combed back, was there. He was manning a dj booth, a pair of headphones clamped firmly over his ears as he flipped switches and turned dials. The second was that it was loud. With the music cranked up all the way mixed in with the laughter of the house's occupants, (Y/N)'s head felt like it was going to burst open. And the third was that it was incredibly crowded. Every inch of space was taken up. It honestly looked like the entire population of Midtown had been invited, and that was a viable possibility. Liz was a popular, pretty, smart senior.

        Speaking of Liz, there she was. (Y/N) smiled when she saw her host, stepping out when she realized that she had practically been hiding behind Peter. Liz pushed through the crowd, returning (Y/N)'s smile when her eyes fell on the trio.

        "Hey, guys! Glad you could come," she exclaimed, a drink in her hand. "Nice to see you, Peter. Ned, nice hat. And you're (Y/N) (Y/L/N), right? You're new?"

        "Yeah, that's me," (Y/N) said. "Thanks for inviting us."

        "Oh, absolutely! You three are pretty awesome." Liz's eyes flicked down to Peter and (Y/N)'s joined hands. "Aw, you two are together? That's so sweet!"

        (Y/N) flushed and looked over to Peter, who looked stricken with embarassment. She kept expecting him to let go and take off, but he never did. And that was one of the best feelings (Y/N) had ever experienced.

        Before the moment could get any more awkward, something shattered in the kitchen. Liz sighed, shaking her head bemusedly.

        "I have to go make sure nobody breaks anything. This is my parents' place, so there'll be hell to pay. Anyways, enjoy the party!"

        (Y/N), Ned, and Peter each thanked her again. They moved to join the crowd, but Flash saw them before they could disappear from view.

        "Hey, Parker!" He shouted, making the entire crowd turn to look at Peter. "Where's your friend? Didn't show up, did he?"

        (Y/N) swiveled around to face Peter, sympathy crossing her face. "Ignore that idiot, Peter. He thinks he's a big shot. You wanna go somewhere else?"

        "Erm... no, thanks. Now that I think about it, I'm not feeling that great. I'm gonna run to the bathroom, okay? Be back in a minute."

        "Oh... okay."

        (Y/N) watched as Peter wove through the crowd, disappearing within seconds. She turned to see Ned, but he was gone. And (Y/N) knew, somehow, that neither of them were going to come back. 

        She turned and slipped into one of the extra bathrooms, already reaching up to unbutton her shirt. She had ended up bringing a backpack to keep her clothes in, just in case she was caught in the exact situation she was in at the moment. 

        (Y/N) slipped her jeans off and stuffed them into her bag, then her shoes and her shirt, leaving herself wearing her suit. She pulled her hair into a ponytail to keep it out of her face and slipped her motorcycle helmet on, then turned to look at her reflection in the mirror.

        Only the girl in the mirror wasn't (Y/N) (Y/L/N) anymore. She wasn't a high school student, and she definitely wasn't on a failed date with a boy. No, this was Pulse. And Pulse was ready to go.

***

        In the other bathroom, just down the hallway, Peter was doing the same thing as (Y/N). His suit was already on and the only thing he had to do was get his mask on, get onto the roof, and do what Ned had told him. He didn't exactly want to crash Liz's party as Spiderman, but he did want to show Flash up and look good. Just a swing-through, a few words, a mention of himself, and he could leave. Simple as that.      

        Peter had to admit that he felt pretty guilty about leaving (Y/N) out there to fend for herself. He was doing exactly what May had told him not to. But he told himself he would be back to meet her in a few minutes.

        Boy, was he wrong.

***        Peter, sighing in frustration, watched as the web line shot out of his webshooters, unraveling until he couldn't see the end of it and he shut them off. There was nothing within his range nearby that he could use to reach the source of an odd explosion. 

        He had been hanging out on Liz's roof- no, that wasn't weird at all- and trying to figure out if he really wanted to pull out the Spiderman party trick for Ned's benefit when he had noticed a blue mushroom cloud rising up from the trees a few miles away. Peter had figured that if he was in suit and everything, it wouldn't hurt to check it out. Anyways, the cloud had looked... well, to put it simply, not of his world. There was something ethereal and unnatural about them. 

        So there he was, running through a golf course in the middle of the night, in his Spiderman suit, with the sprinklers on. It was... certainly an interesting situation.

        Two or three streets away, (Y/N) had taken a very different approach to the situation. She had also seen the odd explosions while she had been doing her rounds after Peter had left, and she had taken off immediately. But, unlike Peter, her approach was working in a very... how do I say this... effective manner.

        (Y/N) may or may not have hijacked a skateboard from one of the families of the suburban neighborhood. Well, hijacked wasn't exactly the best word, as the skateboard had been next to a trashcan on the side of the road. It had looked pretty abandoned, but the four wheels were still attatched and the board was intact, so it worked fine. (Y/N) found that she enjoyed the sensation of soaring through the streets.

***

        Peter arrived at the site of the explosions within a few minutes. It was easier for him to move when he had access to trees, telephone poles, and the like. 

        The source of the disturbance was situated under a concrete bridge. Peter could hear sounds, the voices of adult men. After each exchange came a loud boom, then an explosion, then laughter. These people... they were reckless, and that was a really bad quality in criminals. It meant that they wouldn't have any qualms about killing him, regardless of how old he sounded or what he did.

        Peter had climbed up the supports of the bridge, his suit's enhanced abilities making it easier for him to stick to surfaces. He was perched under an outcrop and had been attempting to stay as unnoticed as he could. But, sadly, Ned decided otherwise.

        Suddenly, the awful sound of yodeling mixed in with country music resounded from the pocket of Peter's suit. He cursed under his breath, pulling out his cell phone to reveal the familiar image of Ned making a dumb face. He poked the screen several times, trying to end the call, but his suit wasn't cooperating. It took seveal attempts to stop the song, but by then, the damage was done.

        "You sold us out?!" One of the men asked, turning to pull a gun on the dark-skinned man who had been watching his antics.

        "Whoa, whoa, whoa," the dark-skinned man exclaimed, taking a step backwards with his hands up. "I don't know what's going on, don't-"

        Peter moved before he actually knew what he was doing. He jumped down from his hiding spot, landing in a neat crouch on the pinestraw.

        "Wait! If you're going to shoot someone, shoot me!"

        That definitely got their attention. All eyes were on Peter, following his every move. All weapons, too. That is, until a certain female hero rolled into the clearing on her recently acquired skateboard.

        Pulse hopped off of the vehicle, both hands automatically raising and beginning to glow with her warning tone of (f/c).

        "I want weapons on the ground and hands in the air before I fire this first shot or there's going to be an awful lot of pain right here, right now." Her voice was slightly muffled by the helmet, as always, but that was enough for Peter to confirm the theory that she was a teenager. It was the first time he had ever heard her speak, and her voice was definitely that of a young woman's. It was also vaguely familiar, but he couldn't figure out where he had heard it. And it wasn't like Peter had that much time to think about it.

        In a flurry of motion, the man holding the large metal weapon lashed his arm out and twisted his wrist. The cuff seemed to glow blue for a moment before expelling a blast of energy that matched that of the explosions.

        Peter jumped forwards, trying to shove Pulse out of the way, but she simply held up a hand. Her palm faced outward towards the weapon. Her veins pulsated with (f/c) light. With a choke and a sputter, the energy dissolved into the air.

        "That was cute, buddy. Now put the weapon down like I asked or we're going to have an issue, and you don't want that."

        The man looked down at his weapon in shock, then charged it back up and attempted to fire it again. Pulse reacted the exact same way, shutting the weapon down. Peter couldn't see her face behind the visor of her helmet, but he could imagine how expressionless she probably was.

        "It's called an electromagnetic pulse," she said calmly. "You can't mess around with that kind of energy. It hinders your weapon's ability to function, and there's nothing you can do to hurt me."

        There was a moment of silence. The man raised his weapon again and Pulse sighed, preparing to stop another attack, but he changed tactics quickly.

        "Last time I checked, your freaky little friend doesn't have electro-whatevers," he smirked. "So I can still hurt him fine."

        Pulse realized what he meant and tried to stop him, but it was too late. The man had already fired his weapon in Peter's direction. A pulse of energy that seemed similar to her powers was released, slamming into his chest and pushing him into the concrete support.

        Peter lay there in shock for a few seconds, trying to recover his senses enough to move. In that short period of time, the man who had been silent for the entire proceeds whipped a gun out of his pocket. He trained it on Pulse, aiming for her chest, but she noticed his actions and ducked out of the way. Still, when the bullet was fired, it buried itself in her left shoulder.

        Pulse let out a cry of pain, whirling around with the force of the shot and crumpling to the ground a few feet away from Peter. The three men took advantage of the heroes' momentary lapse of strength.

        They hopped into their respective vehicles and took off, roaring away in a desperate escape attempt. Peter was able to reach out and fire a long strand of webbing in the direction of the van. It snagged on one of the doors and stuck as the car began to move, which was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because Peter wasn't planning on letting the criminals get away, and a curse because... well...

        As the van gathered speed, Peter was dragged along with it. And, due to the direction it was traveling in, he was pulled towards Pulse.

        The female hero had rolled onto her back and was clutching at the wound in her shoulder, trying to stem the flow of blood. Gasps of pain escaped her mouth as she struggled to get to her feet to no avail.

        When the driver gunned the engine, Peter's body was dragged on top of Pulse's. She yelped, trying to flip over, but he was too heavy. Somehow he managed to fire his webshooters again and get her tangled up. Their bodies were pressed up against each other, chest to chest, which was awkward for both teenagers.

        "What the hell?" Pulse yelped, reaching up with her uninjured arm to try and put some space between herself and the masked hero. "Let go of me, Webby!"

        "Sorry!" Peter exclaimed. He tried to cut her free, but it wasn't working and he had nothing sharp enough to penetrate his webbing material. "Sorry, sorry, sorry! Just let me-"

        "Gah! Don't touch that!"

        "I don't have much of a choice! If you hadn't noticed, I'm in the same boat you're in!"

        "It's your webbing, moron! Does it dissolve?"

        "In two hours, yeah!"

        "What?!" Pulse shrieked, causing Peter to wince. "Two freaking hours?! I'm gonna murder you, Webby!"

        "It's Spiderman!"

        "Like I care!"

        Peter glared at Pulse, but there wasn't much of an effect due to her mask. After a moment of silence, the only sound being that of the car engine, he sighed and shook his head.

        "Nothing I can do for now, lady. We're stuck."

        Pulse growled and shifted around, trying to avoid getting more of a road burn than she already had. She reached into a compartment of her suit and withdrew a switchblade, then got to work trying to cut herself free. It took a few minutes and Peter's side took a few blows from a trash can, but it was totally worth it, because she wasn't stuck to him any more.

        "Oh, thank-"

        "Not now," Pulse muttered. She grabbed a hold of Peter's webs with one hand and used them to pull herself and 'Webby' to their feet. "Focus on getting them."        

        "Fine. Any good- WHOA!"

        Peter was cut off when one of the men in the van fired his weapon, blasting one of the two doors away. The second followed soon after, leaving both heroes with no way to catch them.

        "Crap. Any bright ideas from Webby?"

        "Nah. But I know a shortcut," Peter said. He jumped to his feet,rubbing the small of his back where he had been burned. "Is your shoulder doing okay?"

        "I was shot. No, no it's not. Lead on, Bug Boy."

        "Spiders aren't-"

        "Just shut up and get moving. We're losing them."

        Peter nodded and started moving. He ran ahead of Pulse, but he was constantly looking back to make sure she wasn't lagging or passed out. She was still losing blood and, in the faint light of the neighborhood, he could see that the left shoulder of her suit was glistening red.

        His 'shortcut' didn't seem that short in reality. Actually, it was quite long. It required jumping from building to building and freaking the people who lived in the suburbs out, which was sort of enjoyable.

        The first encounter was with a pair of men who were playing table tennis in their garage. Pulse sped by without a second glance, while Peter ended up greeting them and wishing them good luck during their game.

        The second was some poor man who had been minding his own business with a barbecue on his porch. Again, Pulse paid him no attention. Peter told him how good it smelled. 

        On the way, the duo managed to crash a pool party, break an entire storage shed, bring a treehouse from its tree to the ground, and dismantle a brick chimmney. 

        "Almost there!" Peter shouted, glancing over his shoulder to check on Pulse. She was right behind him, keeping up easily enough. "Are you okay?"

        "Mind your own business, Spiderboy! I'm fine. There's the van! What's your plan?"

        "I was supposed to have a plan?"

        "Urgh! Come on, you're supposed to be some sort of great superhero! This is your hometown, kid!"

        "Fine! Fine, fine... jump!"

        Without a warning, Peter grabbed Pulse's forearm and pulled her closer to him. He jumped off of the roof, aiming for the van, but they never touched the ground. Instead, a pair of claws wrapped around his shoulders and he was pulled skyward. Pulse screamed, grabbing his hand and trying to latch onto Peter as they were lifted higher and higher by the metal demon.


End file.
